Anarchy, extrajudicial killings erode a once stable social fabric

As extrajudicial killings by both rogue government operatives and lynch mobs rage in Mt Kenya region, elders, politicians and the clergy want immediate rollout of public barazas to sensitize area people on rule of law.

According to end of 2023 Crime Research Bureau report, Mt Kenya on average was losing six(6) people per day to crime of murder, two(2) of them to unexplained gunfire.

This translates to about 2,190 violent deaths in that year where coupled with illicit brews, suicide and boda boda accidents defines a picture of a region on a self annihilation mission.

Causes of deaths were explained to be out of fire exchange (the report did not clarify whether it is between police officers and suspects) as well as deranged minds fighting out their disputes as well as lynch mobs.

"This is a serious state of affairs where on daily basis this region must report cases of either youths gunned down, others lynched while more kill each other in confrontations. At best, we can only be defined as a region of anarchy," said Kikuyu Council of Elders Chairman Mr Wachira Kiago.

The region has of late reported daredevil cases of lynch mobs gatecrashing into police stations, stone officers out of the stations and proceeding to hound suspects out of cells and lynching them right in police compounds.

In other incidents, lynch mobs have also been raiding hospitals and plucking admitted suspects out of their beds, lynching them right in the health facilities' compounds.

Cooperatives CS Wycliffe Oparanya in his recent tour of duty in Murang'a County lamented that "a productive community is losing many lives in suspicious incidents, some of them linked to brute force from officers".

He ordered area police to respect rule of law and shepherd residents to amicable dispute resolutions instead of resorting to violence.

Mr Kiago said unemployment, depression, and collapsed faith in the justice system is the root cause of the murderous wave raging in Mt Kenya.

"Criminals are citing unemployment as their motivation. Those who fight and murder each other as well as those who commit suicide are said to be victims of mental health complications while lynch mobs that murder suspects justify their heinous activities by citing police and judiciary corruption," he said.

Retired Most Reverend Peter Kairo says it has reached a point where his fingers are always on the Rosary praying for peace, love, and prosperity to conquer the rising cases of violence, detachments and poverty.

"Now past 80 years, it can be said that I have seen much. It is true. But it is disheartening to age in a scaring environment where society has become more determined to hurt than to love, to impoverish more than empowering and where human life has become so cheap especially in this region," Rev Kairo told us.

He said the region urgently need redemption prayers as well as government action that will sensitise both police and civilians on the sanctity of life.

"It must be made clear that life belongs to God and at no time should it be taken under whatever justification. As a country of the rule of law and moral values, we should all rally behind the culture of letting God give abd take life," he said.

The retired priest said he still harbours lots of hope and faith that Kenya and Kenyans are not a lost cause that “since God will always be God and his plans for us are that we prosper, the devil of hurt and the gods of poverty be defeated.”

Murang'a Senator Mr Joe Nyutu on Monday told AVDelta News that "our county is among the most affected by those murders, most of them covered up to never reach public scrutiny".

He said "in the guise of fighting pineapple thieves in the American owned Del Monte plantation many deaths occur".

He added that it is in Murang'a where we are currently debating the September 9, 2024, pointblank shooting of three(3) males at Mutoho village in a design that reeks of officially premeditated murders by suspected government actors.

"We need public barazas back where the National Government Administration Officers (Ngao) will make the society embrace rule of law. The late John Michuki who successfully served us as interior minister had ordered Ngao to be convening monthly public barazas at sub location level to discuss security," he said.

Mr Nyutu said nowadays Ngao rarely engages citizens through public barazas and only comes out to react on runaway criminal waves that periodically erupt in the region.

Advocate of the high court Mr Timothy Kariuki on Monday told us that "when police are the major suspects in using security shortcuts then the country queues on the lane of collective anarchy".

He said "if suspects are being abducted, held incommunicado and ending up dead on alleys and forests...then it becomes problematic to articulate on how best to protect the Bill of Rights".

He said when law enforcers become rogue and compete with gangsters to execute cold-blooded murders "then it is no wonder when lynch mobs believe they are being patriotic by helping the government murder suspects".

He said "that is the anarchy that we have unfortunately become and something urgent must be done to tame the recklessness from becoming a nationally accepted culture".

National Congress Youths Alliance national leader Ms Gladys Njoroge on Monday told us that "Mt Kenya in it's current love for self inflicted deaths can be mistaken for self hate driven culling".

She said "police are murdering people, we are murdering ourselves in all manner of violence and above all, we appear content that this is good culture...The government appear to be celebrating our murderous enterprise".

She said "livestock and crop thieves nabbed with evidence worth as little as Sh200, those stupidly suspected to be witches, business deals' cons are being murdered and the government ends up arresting no one hence helping us sink deeper into anarchy".

She said “the problem we have is that our president is overprotective to the government he oversees, despite it being a major suspect in abductions and extrajudicial killings”.

She urged Interior CS Kithure Kindiki to be objective in responses to anarchy concerns because if they decide to justify the killings through cheeky case studies, "our goose ends up cooked".

Central Region Commissioner Pius Murugu said "we are working hard to partner with the communities to ensure rule of law is our culture".

"We are concerned about those incidents that are occasionally popping out and beneath the silence is a vicious demand to our officers that rule of law is nonnegotiable," Mr Murugu said.

Bunge la Mwananchi actor representing Mt Kenya region, Kelvin Mutwiri, on Monday said that "if the cops know that they cannot secure a conviction against suspected hardcore criminals or repeat offenders who are terrorising the public, they just kill them in a gangster manner".

He said "ours is a broken criminal justice system where there exists grave perceptions that police, judges and magistrates are also corrupt and incompetent...citizens believing that by murdering suspects and also settling scores through violence is good justice".

Mr Geoffrey Kahuthu who is an advocate of the High Court opines that "it is a poorly kept secret that operational incompetencies in the linkage of justice system gravely induces dysfunctional modus operandi in Mt Kenya that is making cops and even members of the public use extrajudicial means to deal with criminals".