Moi, Daniel Toroitich arap

▪ 1999

      On Jan. 5, 1998, Daniel arap Moi was sworn in for a fifth term as president of Kenya after being declared the winner of national elections held in December 1997. Although the elections were marred by riots and demonstrations, and although Moi's opponents charged the ruling Kenya African National Union (KANU) party with widespread electoral fraud, an independent commission found the elections to have been legitimate. Charges of fraud and corruption were nothing new to Moi; similar accusations had been leveled against him during previous campaigns. In any event, Moi responded to critics in the manner to which they had become accustomed during his 20-year rule—he ignored them. A favourable new biography published in November raised as many questions as it answered.

      Moi was born in 1924 in Sacho, in what was then Britain's Kenya colony. A member of the Sudanic Kalenjin people, an ethnic minority in the predominantly Bantu nation, he was educated at mission and government schools. At the age of 21 he became a teacher. In the early 1950s the Mau Mau rebellion broke out in the colony. As a Kalenjin, Moi was not involved in the rebellion, which was almost solely the work of the Bantu Kikuyu people. The revolt was the harbinger of Kenyan independence, and Moi's teaching background led to his appointment as minister of education in a transition government in the early 1960s. Although Moi had originally been chairman of the Kenya African Democratic Union, a party composed of minority peoples, he joined the Kikuyu-dominated KANU in 1964. That same year Kenya became an independent nation, and Moi was appointed minister of home affairs. In 1967 he was appointed vice president.

      With the death of Jomo Kenyatta in 1978, Moi became president. He promoted his Kalenjin countrymen to positions of authority in his government at the expense of the Kikuyu and curried the favour of the army, which proved loyal to him in suppressing a coup attempt in 1982. Moi also continued Kenyatta's pro-Western policies, which ensured significant sums of development aid during the Cold War. Although corruption was endemic and civil rights more of an abstract concept than a reality, under Moi's stewardship Kenya emerged as one of the most prosperous and stable African nations.

      As Moi consolidated his power, he consistently refused to consider constitutional reforms. Dissent grew, and the 1997 elections were the greatest challenge of his political career. A disorganized opposition (there were about a dozen other presidential candidates) and an electoral system that overwhelmingly favoured the ruling party ensured his reelection. Violence continued after the election, and hundreds of Kenyans, mainly Kikuyu, were killed.

JOHN H. MATHEWS

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