Unity in Christ Phase II – Peace Building after 2007-2008 Post-election Violent Conflict in Kenya

Background:
In Kenya, the announcement of presidential elections results electoral on 30th of December, 2007 which declared the incumbent president Mwai Kibaki as the winner triggered violence.2 Initially the violence seemed spontaneous, a mere expression of protest amid claims that presidential vote was rigged. By the time peace agreement was signed on 28th January, 2008 after a sustained African Union led mediation process, more than a thousand people had lost their lives, 350,000 displaced and property estimated to be worth billions of Kenya shillings destroyed.

As a part of its witnessing, the church has engaged in peace building activities in Kenya
particularly after the 2007-2008 post-electoral violent conflict which left the Kenyan society severely divided. Internally, the Church established Peace Building, Conflict and Disaster Response Department as a part of its 2009-2013 strategic plan and correspondingly undertook training of its leaders in peace building and reconciliation so as to prepare them in reaching out to the society so much crying for peace and reconciliation. Externally, the church has reached out to its congregants and the wider Kenyan society with a goal of creating constituencies of peace and reconciling individuals and groups. This has been done through Unity in Christ Project Phase II. The project has had a three years cycle run from 2011 to 2013.

Purpose/objective:
The objective of this evaluation is to identify outcomes of the project, to examine the
effectiveness of the activities undertaken, management and organizational practices, learning and investigate the potential for sustaining the activities that were implemented and their further development.

Methodology:
Regarding methodology, the evaluation has used triangulated methodology. As such, it contains several components: desk review of existing scholarly literature and project documents; site visits to projects areas to ascertain the kind and progress of various projects initiated; focus group discussion, informal conversations and interviews. Data gathered has been analyzed qualitatively and inferences made.

The study has adopted conflict transformation model as developed by Lederach and others to evaluate the success of the project. The framework is based on the premise that for conflict management, peace building and reconciliation efforts to be sustainable they must include all levels of the society and exploit indigenous peacemaking resources in a given society.

Key findings:
Specifically the evaluation makes the following findings: The selection criterion for trainees on conflict management and reconciliation workshops was representative catering for different categories-leaders, women and youths. However, owing to the extensive geographical coverage and the high number of congregations, not all of them were represented and going forward there is a need to either expand the number of trainees or use the parish level in place of diocese to do the training. Equally there is a need to rationalize geographical coverage in order to avoid overreach and target efforts where they are most needed.

The evaluation team concludes that the Unity in Christ II project has achieved objectives of the project especially in addressing conflict in areas of its operations. Most noticeable are the conflict management efforts in Borabu/Sotik border, an area which has suffered from cycles of violence between members of Kisii and Kalejin communities, in Migori where there has been success in addressing conflict between Luo and Kisii communities and Sondu where Lutheran peacemakers have successfully managed to mediate conflict between Luo and Nandi communities.

Recommendations: 
Drawing on the findings the report recommends that ELCK should institutionalize conflict management and reconciliation activities through training of professional peacemakers, integration of such activities in curricula of various courses offered in its colleges and development of peace and conflict studies courses. Also it should establish independent project implementation units; set up an investment unit to manage its many facilities which are currently underutilized yet they have huge potential for generating needed resources for various projects, develop a gender mainstreaming policy to enhance the participation of members of the female gender and develop mechanisms for engaging top level leadership and participating in policy making.

Comments from the organisation, if any:
The evaluation gives a good overview of achievements and challenges as we have known the project.  As the project is ended, it is up to the ELCK to carry on the specific work.  On NLM’s behalf we specifically notice the lesson on organization of the project.