Thursday, February 28

A power-sharing deal...

...for the Nairobi mayor's office. After a recent disputed election, evenly split between the Party of National Unity (President Kibaki's party) and the Orange Democratic Movement (Odinga's), the latter will take the mayor's office and the former the deputy's post. Now if they can just extend this cooperation to the national level... (Nation).

Kofi Annan, along with visiting Tanzanian president/African Union chair Jakaya Kikwete, continues to discuss a power-sharing arrangement directly with Kibaki and Odinga. They've been talking for hours, so hopefully making some progress. Protests that the opposition had planned for today have been put off.

Meanwhile, the Times' foreign commentator Bronwen Maddox discusses recent comments by Britain's top Africa diplomat about using Kenya's army to quell any future violence:

"The British Government's hope that the Kenyan Army can be a force for stability puts too much weight on that valuable but fragile institution. The danger is that if the Army takes on the burden of quelling violence that would likely follow the collapse of talks, the ethnic tensions that have torn Kenya apart will fracture the Army as well."

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