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KENYA

Founding president and liberation struggle icon Jomo KENYATTA led Kenya from independence until his death in 1978, when President Daniel Toroitich arap MOI took power in a constitutional succession. The country was a de facto one-party state from 1969 until 1982 when the ruling Kenya African National Union (KANU) made itself the sole legal party in Kenya. MOI acceded to internal and external pressure for political liberalization in late 1991. The ethnically fractured opposition failed to dislodge KANU from power in elections in 1992 and 1997, which were marred by violence and fraud, but are viewed as having generally reflected the will of the Kenyan people. President MOI stepped down in December of 2002 following fair and peaceful elections. Mwai KIBAKI, running as the candidate of the multiethnic, united opposition group, the National Rainbow Coalition, defeated KANU candidate Uhuru KENYATTA and assumed the presidency following a campaign centered on an anticorruption platform.

LOCATION 

Eastern Africa, bordering the Indian Ocean, between Somalia and Tanzania.

POPULATION

32,021,856
note: estimates for this country explicitly take into account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS; this can result in lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality and death rates, lower population and growth rates, and changes in the distribution of population by age and sex than would otherwise be expected (July 2004 est.).

Protestant 45%, Roman Catholic 33%, indigenous beliefs 10%, Muslim 10%, other 2%. note: a large majority of Kenyans are Christian, but estimates for the percentage of the population that adheres to Islam or indigenous beliefs vary widely.

NATURAL RESOURCES 

Gold, limestone, soda ash, salt, rubies, fluorspar, garnets, wildlife, hydropower. the Kenyan Highlands comprise one of the most successful agricultural production regions in Africa; glaciers are found on Mount Kenya, Africa's second highest peak; unique physiography supports abundant and varied wildlife of scientific and economic value.

NATURAL CHALLENGES

Water pollution from urban and industrial wastes; degradation of water quality from increased use of pesticides and fertilizers; water hyacinth infestation in Lake Victoria; deforestation; soil erosion; desertification; poaching.

ECONOMICS

The regional hub for trade and finance in East Africa, Kenya has been hampered by corruption, notably in the judicial system, and by reliance upon several primary goods whose prices have remained low. In 1997, the IMF suspended Kenya's Enhanced Structural Adjustment Program due to the government's failure to maintain reforms and curb corruption. A severe drought from 1999 to 2000 compounded Kenya's problems, causing water and energy rationing and reducing agricultural output. As a result, GDP contracted by 0.2% in 2000. The IMF, which had resumed loans in 2000 to help Kenya through the drought, again halted lending in 2001 when the government failed to institute several anticorruption measures. Despite the return of strong rains in 2001, weak commodity prices, endemic corruption, and low investment limited Kenya's economic growth to 1.2%. Growth lagged at 1.1% in 2002 because of erratic rains, low investor confidence, meager donor support, and political infighting up to the elections. In the key 27 December 2002 elections, Daniel Arap MOI's 24-year-old reign ended, and a new opposition government took on the formidable economic problems facing the nation. In 2003, progress was made in rooting out corruption, and encouraging donor support, with GDP growth edging up to 1.7%.

Debt - external: $5.916 billion (2004 est.)

Economic aid - recipient: $453 million (1997)

Internet hosts: 8,325 (2003)

Internet users: 400,000 (2002)

CONFLICTS 

Kenya's administrative boundary still extends into the Sudan, creating the "Ilemi Triangle"; Kenya has acted as an important mediator in Sudan's north-south civil war; Kenya and Uganda are working together to stem cattle rustling and violence by Lord's Resistance Army along the border.

OTHER CONSIDERATIONS

Widespread harvesting of small plots of marijuana; transit country for South Asian heroin destined for Europe and North America; Indian methaqualone also transits on way to South Africa; significant potential for money-laundering activity given the country's status as a regional financial center, massive corruption, and relatively high levels of narcotics-associated activities. ## All Rights Reserved. TheWeekInCongress.com. Images and data: US CIA.