NAIROBI, Kenya — Several people were beaten and hacked to death with machetes in a Nairobi slum Sunday in renewed ethnic fighting over Kenya’s disputed election, residents said.
The re-election of President Mwai Kibaki has tapped into a well of resentments that resurfaces regularly at election time in Kenya. But never before has it been so prolonged or taken so many lives.
A government commission says more than 600 people have been killed in violence that erupted after the Dec. 27 election, which opposition leader Raila Odinga accused Kibaki of stealing.
Sunday’s bloodshed in Nairobi’s Mathare slum, like much of the fighting since the vote, was between the Kikuyu and Luo ethnic groups, said resident Boniface Shikami. President Kibaki is a Kikuyu and Odinga is a Luo.
Shikami said Luos in his street had received notices warning them to leave by nightfall or risk attack.
One man staggered past with blood streaming from the stump of his arm, which had been cut off with a machete. The arm was taken by a group of youths and placed on top of a pile of stones barricading an alleyway.
In a separate incident, around 50 people attacked welder Dominic Owour, a 23-year-old Luo, and tried to cut off both his hands at the forearm, Owour said.
Both men said police watching the attacks did not intervene.
Dr. Njoroge Waithaka said 13 people had been admitted to Kenyatta Hospital, mostly with ax and machete cuts on the upper limbs and head.
Filipe Rebeiro of aid group Doctors Without Borders said his organization treated 10 people for machete and ax wounds on Sunday morning alone.
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