Post-election violence continued Jan. 28 in western Kenya between members of the country's two largest tribes, the Kikuyu and the Luo. An estimated 22 deaths were reported during clashes in the town of Naivasha, a center of the fresh-cut flower trade located about 55 miles northwest of the capital, Nairobi. At one point, paramilitary police fired live rounds into the air to disperse a crowd of belligerents estimated at 1,000 strong. Road traffic was disrupted at the town, located along the strategic highway linking Nairobi to the country's West. Previous clashes in the western towns of Kisumu and Eldoret have disrupted road and rail infrastructure on which Africa's Great Lakes region relies heavily. Key segments of Kenya's considerable economy — East Africa's largest, with a gross domestic product of $19 billion — including its fresh-cut flower, tea-growing, and safari tourism sectors have been disrupted because of the protests and violence. Deep tensions between the Luo and the Kikuyu have fueled tribal violence that has killed more than 700 Kenyans since clashes first erupted Dec. 30, 2007, and caused an estimated quarter of a million people to flee their homes. The violence now appears to be spinning out of control, and could make western Kenya — the Luo heartland — a no-go area for the government and industry. Kenyan police have had to provide security escorts to trucks traveling through western Kenya to and from Uganda and other central African countries, and have prevented mass demonstrations from occurring in Nairobi. However, the country's security forces have been hard-pressed to stop the violence, which has been most intense in the Luo-dominated West. Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and other international statesmen continue mediation efforts in Nairobi aimed at reconciling the positions of Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki (a Kikuyu) and opposition Orange Democratic Movement party leader Raila Odinga (a Luo). Though the two party heads met Jan. 24 for the first time since the controversial December 2007 election that returned Kibaki to power, no breakthrough was achieved, nor was one expected. The current tribal clashes stem from long-standing grievances that were manipulated and stoked by political patrons during the run-up to the elections and then during the early post-election protests. The situation echoes a similar electoral campaign of manipulating ethno-nationalistic politics that occurred in the West African country of Cote d'Ivoire during that country's presidential elections in 2000 — that campaign directly contributed to Cote d'Ivoire's 2002-2003 civil war, which divided its northern and southern regions, and from which it still has not fully recovered. The United Nations maintains 8,000 peacekeepers in Cote d'Ivoire to observe a cease-fire between northern rebels and the country's southern-based government. Negotiations between the Ivorian government and the rebel New Forces have led to a tenuous peace agreement, but the cocoa-rich country effectively remains partitioned. It remains to be seen whether Kenya will follow Cote d'Ivoire down the path to a full partition, complete with U.N. peacekeepers; however, the situation in the West is getting beyond Nairobi's control. Unless Odinga and Kibaki can reach some sort of settlement — and there has been no indication that either is willing to budge — western Kenya increasingly seems to be prepared to go its own way.