Drop charges against Narok leaders and apologise, Khalwale tells Nkaissery, IG

NAIROBI: Kakamega Senator Boni Khalwale Thursday lashed out at the Cabinet Secretary for Interior, Mr Joseph Nkaissery and the acting Inspector General of Police Samuel Arachi following the arrest of five MPs over the chaos that rocked Narok County.

Addressing a news conference at County Hall in Nairobi, Dr Khalwale said the arrest amounted to “intimidation of political leaders” for leading their constituents to a protest.  He asked the Cabinet Secretary to drop the charges against the leaders.

“The answers that Nkaissery and Arachi should be giving Kenyans is what went wrong during the demonstrations to an extent that people died. They were supposed to provide security to the demonstrators, they cannot turn around and arrest leaders for their failure to provide security,” said Khalwale.

Speaking a day after Narok Senator Stephen Ntutu and MPs Moitalel ole Kenta (Narok North), Korei ole Lemein (Narok South), Patrick Ntutu (Narok West) and Johanna Ng’eno (Emurua Dikirr) were arrested, and the day on which they were charged in court, the Kakamega senator said the security bosses had to apologise for the arrest and the chaos.

Nkaissery had banned the demos in Narok, but Khalwale said Nkaissery, as Cabinet Secretary, had no legal power to “take away that which is provided for in the Constitution”.

“The Constitution does not contemplate a situation where a peaceful demo can be banned,” said the Kakamega senator.

Drawing on his long-service as a former chairman of the Public Accounts Committee of the National Assembly (in the Tenth Parliament) and his current position of the County Public Accounts and Investment Committee in the Senate, Khalwale said the Narok leaders had “a legitimate reason” to question how the money from Maasai Mara was being used.

“We should ask ourselves, what were the legislators doing? Narok collects a lot of money from Maasai Mara. The protest had to do with the alleged misuse of the resources. Their arrest will lead to the intimidation of leaders so that MPs will be afraid to face the monster of corruption,” said Khalwale.