The fighting seems to be over, but the consequences of the conflict following the disputed election results in Kenya are still being cleaned up. Inflation in Kenya is now above 26 percent. While this is minimal when compared with Zimbabwe’s astronomical inflation rate, it is still very high, particularly when compared with the way inflation is viewed as the key economic challenge in Australia, where the rate is just over 4 percent. Food costs in Kenya are rising at 36 percent per year, partly as a result of the political violence.
Various disaffected groups took advantage of the general insecurity to pursue their own agendas. One of these was the militia calling itself the “Sabaot Land Defence Force”, which used intimidation and extreme violence to pursue its land ownership claims. The leader of the group was killed just over a week ago, and now large numbers of members of the group are coming forward and claiming that they only joined the group because of coercion.
The resettlement of people who became refugees because of the violence is likely to take some time. As this includes a number of farmers, next year’s crops are at risk. Further, the cost of fertilisers, which need to be imported, is now very high, and a sizeable proportion of farmers are expected to plant without using them, so that the resulting crop is likely to be much diminished.