Kenya is gearing up for an election on December 27 in which president Mwai Kibaki is bidding for a second five-year term but faces stiff opposition from Raila Odinga of the Orange Democratic Movement.

Analysts say the race is too close to call, but Mr Odinga, who supported the president at the previous election and once served in his cabinet, has been ahead in the polls for several months. An Odinga victory would mark the first time in Kenya’s short history of multi-party democracy that an incumbent president had been ejected at an election.