KENYA: KENYA'S GENERAL ELECTION ENTERS FINAL CAMPAIGN DAY/ OPPOSITION CANDIDATE CHRISTIANA JEBICHI NGOIGO TELLS HOW SHE WAS KIDNAPPED BY RULING PARTY OFFICIALS

Record ID: 347503

  • Title: KENYA: KENYA'S GENERAL ELECTION ENTERS FINAL CAMPAIGN DAY/ OPPOSITION CANDIDATE CHRISTIANA JEBICHI NGOIGO TELLS HOW SHE WAS KIDNAPPED BY RULING PARTY OFFICIALS
  • Date: 27th December 1997
  • Summary: MOGOTIA, KENYA (DECEMBER 28, 1997) (RTV - ACCESS ALL) 1. WS SUPPORTERS ESCORTING PARLIAMENTARY CANDIDATE CHRISTIANA JEBICHII NGOIGO 0.15 2. SLV BUS PASSES/TILT DOWN TO NGOIGO SAYING: SO WHEN I REFUSED, THEY FORCED ME TO WRITE A LETTER. BUT I REFUSED TO WRITE A LETTER TO THE ELECTORAL COMMISSION, I JUST WROTE TO THE HEAD OF S
  • Embargoed: 11th January 1998 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: MOGOTIA, SUBUKIA, NAIROBI, NAIVASHA, KENYA
  • City:
  • Country: Kenya
  • Reuters ID: LVA5NDI3M056Y346I1SNHWNTBTH6
  • Story Text: INTRO: Kenya's general election entered its final campaign day on Sunday with rival parties gearing up their publicity machines in a bid to attract votes.

    Christiana Jebichii Ngoigo, an opposition candidate, has said she was "kidnapped" by ruling party officials and personally told by President Daniel arap Moi to withdraw from the race.

    Christiana Jebichii Ngoigo, a former school administrator standing for the Social Democrat Party (SDP) in a Rift Valley constituency, told Reuters on Sunday (Dec 28) she had been snatched on Friday from a hotel in the Central province town of Nakuru, and taken to a nearby police compound.

    Ngoigo spent the night in a police cell and was released on Saturday morning only after writing a letter to Moi saying she "would consider quitting" and after a group of party supporters besieged the Menengai police station where she was being held.

    Ngoigo said she was questioned by officials of the ruling Kenya African National Union (KANU) party -- including the vice-chancellor of one of Kenya's five public universities -- about why she was running for parliament against their candidate.

    When she refused to write a letter to the electoral commission saying she would withdraw from the race, she said officials told her Moi wanted to talk to her.

    "Then I spoke to him (Moi) on the phone," she said. "It was him .. he asked me to respect him and withdraw as the seat was not important." But Ngoigo said she believed she could win the seat for the SDP, the party headed by Charity Ngilu, and had no intention of quitting.

    President Moi later addressed a crowd during his campaign tour of the area where Christiana Ngoigo had earlier spoken to Reuters about her kidnap.

    While the 1992 poll was marred by violence in which hundreds of people were killed and tens of thousands displaced, this year's election has been relatively peaceful, although incidents of violence have increased in the days leading up to the poll.

    All three of Kenya's national daily newspapers devoted the bulk of their Sunday editions to election coverage, with campaign advertisements filling the remaining space.

    Both the ruling party-owned Sunday Times and the Sunday Standard carried front-page stories saying a poll by Public Universities Research Team predicted President Daniel arap Moi would be returned to power with 49.2 percent of the vote.

    The independent Sunday Nation carried a front-page editorial saying Kenyans faced a fundemental choice in Monday's poll: "Continuity or change".

    Moi, 73 and in power since 1978, faces 14 opponents in the race for the presidency while his ruling Kenya African National Union (KANU) takes on 22 other parties for 210 elected seats in the 222-seat National Assembly.

    The president -- who must win the most votes overall as well as at least 25 percent of the vote in five of eight provinces -- appoints the other 12 members of parliament.


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