The road from Eldoret to Kericho used to be one of the prettiest drives in Kenya, a ribbon of asphalt threading through lush tea farms, bushy sugar cane and green humpbacked hills. Now it is a gantlet of machete-wielding teenagers, some chewing stalks of sugar cane, others stumbling drunk.<\/p>\n
On Friday there were no fewer than 20 checkpoints in the span of 100 miles, and at each barricade – a downed telephone pole, a gnarled tree stump – mobs of rowdy young men jumped in front of cars, yanked at door handles and pulled out knives.<\/p>\n
Their actions did not seem to be motivated by ethnic tension, like much of the violence that has killed more than 800 people in Kenya since a flawed election in December.<\/p>\n
It was much simpler than that.<\/p>\n
“Give us money,” demanded one young man who stood defiantly in the road with a bow in his hands and a quiver of poisoned arrows on his back.<\/p>\n