We revisit the night-time terror that saw Bungoma and Busia counties dominate headlines in the past month. Elsewhere in this newspaper, we post findings of our investigative team that spent one week interviewing many of the victims, their relatives, neighbours, security agents, clerics and politicians in the region.
The accounts read like a work of fiction but once the reader steps back a little, the testimonies are very chilling. The United Nations was right to term them crimes against humanity, whose script is being written right before our eyes. And in the interests of justice for those victimised, and in the interest of police officers seeking to redeem their image, as well as a young administration thirsting to stamp its authority and keen to be seen to walk the talk on protecting life, limb and property, government must scramble troopers to its action stations.
It would be important to determine the identity of the young upstart, described in hushed tones as being the chief recruiter of an “army of over 2,600 youths tasked with providing security to politicians” across Western during the campaign period.
This is the first direct umbilical link of the mayhem to its political paymasters. It is also understood that the so-called Kabuchai Defence Forces (KDF), led by one known on the street as “General” is at pains to model itself on the 1970s-style Kakamega terror group Angola-Msumbiji. They must be dealt with like the Sabaot Land Defence Force, Mungiki, Al Shabaab and Mombasa Republican Council.
Secondly, as we have stated here before, local populations, even when they have been threatened into silence, usually know who the rotten apples among them are. And if they are wagging an accusing finger at the upcoming poll petitions, there needs to be deeper investigation.
Such allegations must bear scrutiny because many of these attacks could be revenge attacks by poll losers, ethnic cleansing and forcible relocation of populations so that potential witnesses are silenced or forced to flee into exile.
We are aware that long-serving security agents were all transferred, meaning we are addressing the new boots and Intelligence operatives on the ground. Short of holding their hand and shoving them in a particular direction, they should at the very least put our concerns to rest.
