Retorno tímido ao trabalho

"Timid return to work" was a front-page headline in Notícias yesterday. Our placid daily got three columns out of chapa drivers and market vendors recovering slowly from the break. That was the second story, just below the news of rising floodwaters in central Mozambique. I'm having trouble establishing the details: Zimbabwean media reports two deaths in Mozambique, but the local sources say nothing about it.

Once again I managed to evade the responsibility of office devotions - phone calls from users unable to print or unsure about their start-of-year reports ambushed me on cue. No one seemed to miss it. Most likely it felt too much like Monday for a proper devotional meeting, or perhaps everyone was just feeling timid. I had prepared a piece about new year's resolutions, which aren't done here, so it was a kind of show-and-tell about my exotic foreign culture.

Having arrived early, though, I checked the internet news (my only source these days) and saw what was happening in Kenya - specifically in Kisumu, where our sister bank is located. Sophie and Erick in this photo live there - for those who have been following the issues, Sophie is Kikuyu and Erick is Luo. The helpdesk calls interrupted me while I was hastily taking notes and trying to compose suitable messages of peace and hope.

I've sent a message to Sophie (whom I know best of my colleagues there) to find out what is going on, but so far no reply. It's very likely that the bank is closed until the situation calms down.

I don't want to diminish the enormity of what's happening there - though it isn't genocide, as anyone who knows anything about Rwanda or Darfur can tell you, and the sooner the leaders involved stop making such inflammatory statements, the sooner we will all be out of this. But I do want to call attention to an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal pointing out the difference between the violence in Kenya now and kind of violence that has afflicted African countries so much in the past (the article requires subscription, so here is the section I want noted):

Ten years ago, bolstering a candidate's results by a few percentage points would have been no big thing. In fact, 20 years ago, an 85% result for the incumbent would have been de rigueur. Today, there are more stringent regulations; more Kenyans know their rights; more monitors were at the polls; Kenya's media coverage was extensive; digital media are accelerating the distribution of information; and many people have cellphones with which they can pass on information.

This is not the kind of government-sponsored violence, shoring up those in power, which we have seen in the past. As misguided as it is, it is protest violence, and the message is that the President of Kenya cannot rig an election with impunity.