ODM MP changes tune on abductions
Homa Bay Town MP Peter Kaluma has petitioned the police to take action on the recent spate of abductions
Homa Bay Town and ODM MP Peter Kaluma has petitioned the police to take action on the recent spate of abductions.
In the recent past, Kaluma and the ilk in the ODM party -which now supports President William Ruto’s broad-based administration- suggested that the abductees were faking their disappearances.
The lawmaker is also on record asserting that the abductees might have overstepped and flouted the accountability demands even as they enjoyed their rights and freedoms.
However, on Sunday, January 5, Kaluma seemed to fault the state law enforcers for failing to trace the abductees.
The MP noted that the failure of the state to apprehend and prosecute the abductors was eroding the citizenry’s confidence on the country’s security structure.
According to him, the government exists to protect its civilians and their properties, now seeming to speak against the string of forcible disappearances.
“All governments exist to protect their citizens’ lives, persons and property. The police is the government’s institution for this protection. The failure by the police to find the abductees or to arrest and present a single person involved in those instances of open abductions recorded on camera risks complete erosion and irreversible loss of public confidence in the independent National Police Service and is outright unacceptable! What happened to the long arm of government (read police)? The state security apparatus should investigate, find, and produce the missing Kenyans quickly,” he stated on X.
In the recent past, youth deemed government critics have disappeared, leaving their kin in agony.
The National Police Service (NPS) through Inspector General Douglas Kanja denied the state law enforcers’ involvement in the forcible disappearances.
On December 21, 2024, blogger Peter Muteti was picked by unknown people in Nairobi’s Uthiru area.
The young man was presumably faulted by authorities for publishing offensive tweets ridiculing President William Ruto.
On the day Muteti went missing, Billy Mwangi, another blogger, was picked by unknown people in Embu.
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Billy was in a barber’s shop when the abductors showed up, drugged him out, and bundled him into their waiting double-cabin pickup.
Also missing is digital cartoonist Gideon Kibet and his younger brother Ronny Kiplagat.
Kibet, 23, erupted to fame with his silhouette depictions likened to President Ruto.
He was using his art as a form of anti-government activism, perhaps touching the raw nerves of the abductors believed to be state operatives.
Kibet went missing on Tuesday, December 24, after attending an event in Nairobi to which he had been invited by Busia senator and activist Okiya Omtatah.
Also missing is Bernard Kavuli, a journalism student in Nairobi; he was abducted in Ngong, Kajiado county.
The disappearances has sparked anger from the public which has demanded the state to step up and produce the missing persons.
On December 27, 2024, the president promised to end the spate of abductions.
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