Analyzing Anxiety

Webmaster's note: Governor Dick Wyatt received the following message from Dan and Patty Schmelzer in Kisumu, Kenya, the site of recent rioting and political unrest. Both Dan and Patty are Past Presidents of the Rotary Club of Kisumu, and Dan is currently the Assistant Governor. They operate Capstone Ministries in Kisumu, and formerly were part of the Agape Home there, having moved from Oakdale, CA. Both Dan and Patty have made presentations to many of our District 5220 clubs on behalf of Agape.

I will never forget the first trip that Patty and I made to Kisumu.  We were having lunch at the Chinese restaurant in town and Patty and several others were going to walk across the street to the market.  Now , the street they were crossing was a boulevard and the traffic was moving in the opposite direction than we were used to in the states and she was not with me.  But I remember her telling me later that she felt high anxiety for that one brief jaunt across the street, clutching her purse around her waist fearful of any pickpocket.  Fast forward five years.  Yesterday a group of protestors less than 500 yards from our house were shouting and yelling at police, banging with sticks on tin roofing lying in the road with burning tires strewn everywhere. Gun shots ringing out to disperse the crowds, then the loud crack of a tear gas canister sent into the crowd.  More shouts and yelling, first moving up one direction of Ring Road which borders the slum and milimani (our housing area) and then the other, in running battles with police....and where was Patty during all of this...lying in the hammock reading her last issue of Home and Garden while I am trimming the Mirenga Trees.  Isn't it interesting how the sights and sounds of protesters becomes almost mundane after more than two weeks of nothing but the same, over and over.  There is probably a psychology professor reading this who can give a perfectly understandable explanation for all this.  But it seems rather odd when you place the two incidents side by side in a paragraph.

Kisumu continues this week to be in the headlines around the world as it is the stronghold of Raila Odinga, leader of the ODM opposition party who refuse to acknowledge the tainted results of last years election results announced on Dec. 30.  ODM continues to call for "Mass Action" and more and more the action seems to be committed by the police.  Few regular citizens are involved in the protests anymore.  Now it seems it is thugs and the criminal elements who have taken to the streets to harass the police.  At least this is my perception.  There are some bystanders who become involved and even some children who have been impacted by the violence.  And almost entirely now the victims are those shot or hit by police or by paramilitary units called the GSU.  There is little talk anymore of tribal conflict.  That may be in part because so many people have been displaced or burned out of their homes and are now living in make shift camps around the country, more than 250,000 to date.  Quite a logistical nightmare for Kenya Red Cross to handle. 

This week ODM called from demonstrations on Wed-Friday.  As a result the town came to a halt.  No traffic.  No businesses open. Everything has ground to a halt.  And many are tiring of the ordeal.  Many who were sympathetic to ODM and critical of the government and the electoral commission are now just tired of how long this is dragging out.  They want to get back to work, get their kids in school, open their businesses, do ministry work and soon, start planting their crops at home.  During the last three days 7 were shot and killed in Kisumu including one 10 year old boy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

We continue to stay put in our compound.  We are trying to stay busy with office work, planting in the garden, feeding my turkeys, writing emails, doing some work organizing Rotary and Capstone's intended relief efforts  and even writing a sermon for Sunday.  But with mass action, road blocks and demonstrations, we haven't been able to get out to do much.  That is not to say the work of relief and rebuilding will not be there when we are able to get out and move around.  I was able to drive to town this morning, get a few things at the store and pick up a check for our Rotary Relief efforts from the fund raising Rotarians in Nairobi did for our efforts here in Kisumu.  God bless them.  Now it is almost five in the afternoon on Friday and we are still anticipating the pop, pop, pop of the AK47's this evening. 

We have never felt in danger.  We have been extremely conservative in our movements, always confirming open roads before going anywhere.  Normally we have a staff meeting on Friday morning but we heard the road to Maseno was still blocked by telephone polls.

One positive feature was that on Tues afternoon and evening as the demonstrations were heating up over the election of ODM's man as speaker of the house in Parliament, we had a large rainstorm that moved in and it returned again last night.  We were happy for that as it seemed to dampen tempers of the protestors and the police.  It is hard to run and hard to shoot in the mud and rain!  Another positive note is that former Secretary General Koffi Annan is set to kick off his mediation talks soon between the two parties.  He was to arrive on Tuesday but word was he was battling a bad case of the flu and has not yet arrived.  Another positive news story is that Rotary is very much involved in the relief efforts.  In Nakuru the club is providing shelter for about 1000 displaced people with shelter boxes.  Check out the website at www.shelterboxes.org  Great cause put into effect by a Rotarian from the UK and the RC of Nakuru.  The Nairobi clubs organized to pick up food and clothes for the needy around town and accumulated more than 8 trucks full of items.  We've also handed out food through our church and given our bishop some extra flour and milk to keep in his office when needy cases come knocking.  We'll be doing more as we are able to become more mobile. 

I don't have any more pictures for you.   I'm tired of taking pictures of destruction quite frankly.  The invective of Rodney King seems to ring true, "Can't we all just get along!?"

God bless you and keep praying,

Dan and Patty Schmelzer