Kibaki must give back Kenya's stolen election

Once tribal bloodshed begins, it takes on a momentum of its own. As the inhabitants of Kenya's Rift Valley know from experience, all attacks breed retaliation and violence begets more violence.

An effective peacemaker must apply real pressure before this vicious circle begins in earnest. Yet this obvious maxim seems to have been lost on Lord Malloch-Brown, the Foreign Office minister responsible for Africa.

	President Kibaki has turned a blind eye to the hideous violence that's followed his re-election

Almost a month of killing took place, claiming perhaps 900 lives, before he arrived in Kenya and tried to break the impasse caused by the disputed election.

Lord Malloch-Brown has now left Nairobi for Sudan. To place his visit in context, Kenya has suffered more political killings in the past four weeks than Zimbabwe has known in eight years of turmoil.

His visit seems to have been utterly fruitless. The national broadcaster erroneously managed to claim that his main purpose had been to grant Britain's official recognition to President Mwai Kibaki's government.

Before leaving Kenya, Lord Malloch-Brown publicly lamented the intransigence of Mr Kibaki and his key opponent, Raila Odinga.

Yet the minister, who has long experience of Africa, appears not to have asked himself the crucial question: why is the president so unwilling to compromise?

From Mr Kibaki's point of view, the events of the past four weeks represent an extraordinary triumph. So far, he has managed to rig an election and have himself inaugurated for another five-year term as president. He has done this in the teeth of the condemnation of the blatantly rigged poll delivered by every independent observer group.

Mr Kibaki has appointed a cabinet of his choice and simply ignored calls from Gordon Brown, among others, for him to form a coalition government with a senior post for Mr Odinga.

Most remarkable, Mr Kibaki has done all this without incurring any major penalties from Britain or the West. You can hardly blame him for being determined to tough things out. He has all the confidence of a man who has managed to get away with the political equivalent of murder.

How to remedy this disastrous situation? Effective and robust pressure has been missing from Britain's response to Kenya's crisis. Mr Kibaki will compromise only if the cost of intransigence is made unacceptably high.

Mr Kibaki may have stolen an election and turned a blind eye to hideous violence, but he is no Robert Mugabe. He is not a ruthless, deluded megalomaniac like the Zimbabwean leader.

Mr Kibaki knows full well that Kenya is inherently vulnerable to outside pressure because its economy depends on foreign investment. Unlike Mr Mugabe, he is not willing to see his country bankrupted and its nascent prosperity destroyed.

So he will move if the right levers are used. The first step is to set out Britain's demands.

Incredibly, neither Lord Malloch-Brown nor any other British minister has publicly called for last month's election to be re-run under international supervision. The rigged poll was the principal cause of the violence. The only solution is for Kenya to have another election, under outside supervision if necessary.

If Mr Kibaki fails to oblige, a graduated scale of penalties should be imposed. First, Britain could marshal the EU and America to announce without any ambiguity that they no longer recognise Mr Kibaki as Kenya's president.

From that moment on, he would become an international outlaw. Then Britain could ask the Commonwealth to expel Kenya. Afterwards, London could press the EU to impose penalties targeted on Kenya's government.

Mr Kibaki and all his ministers could be banned from travelling to any EU state, while any assets they hold in European banks could be frozen. Kenyan ministers are not known for their financial probity. A measure that would deprive them of their loot and stop all shopping trips to Europe might concentrate minds.

Along the way, Western aid given directly to Kenya's government could be halted. All this would dramatically reduce foreign investment and deal a body blow to the country's largest single industry, tourism.

Unless Mr Kibaki knows these measures are on the table - and that Britain is serious about imposing them if necessary - he will not agree to hold another election. After all, he might lose such a contest. But without a free and fair poll, Kenya's political crisis will persist and the killings will go on.

In principle, the route out of this confrontation is clearly marked. The tragedy is that Mr Kibaki has been allowed to get away with so much.

Let us hope that the experience of the past four weeks has not convinced him that he can get away with anything.