Mystery of mass graves that haunt the living

By Anderson Ojwang

Many families in Mt Elgon District are still astounded by the mystery of missing relatives killed by the Saboat Land Defence Force (SLDF) and the military during operation okoa maisha.

Some have waited for three years to recover and bury those tortured and brutally slaughtered by the gang and their bodies disposed in pits and mass graves in the vast district.

Others have agonised for seven months after the military arrested and took away their relatives to Kapkota Army Base.

Residents claim that both the gang members and the army buried or threw the bodies in pit latrines, boreholes or special mass graves. However, the military denies involvement in this.

Now they hope that Prof Philip Atkinson, a UN Special Rapporteur who is in the country to probe extra-judicial killings by police and armed gangs will resolve this issue.

Mass burial pits

It is estimated that in most pits there are five to 20 bodies. Efforts to retrieve them have been fruitless as the Government failed to support residents for fear that it could breed insecurity and revenge. In one pit in Emia location, 12 bodies were retrieved last year by villagers and the local chief and only five were identified. The rest were returned since their relatives were not found.

Phylis Samson, a member of the Rural Women Peace Link (RWPL) lost her father and younger brother to the gang in 2007.

"We have been told that the bodies are in a pit in Kipsigon together with 12 others. We are trying to make arrangements to remove them for decent burial," she says.

Samson says the victims were thrown there to conceal evidence and to make tracing by relatives unsuccessful. Through the Rural Women Peace Link, people who witnessed the dumping of victims by the gang have been able to speak out and the information will be used to help relatives trace and identify the sites.

"Most of us know where they were dumped and we want the Government to help retrieve and bury them to avoid bad omen befalling us," she says.

Justus Karoria, who lives near a farm where the gang allegedly threw bodies, says armed men brought the bodies at night.

"They threw them in the water wells. The bodies that were removed had visible deep cuts and bullet holes," he says.

Emia sub-chief Eliud Kiptalam confirmed that bodies were dumped in pits adding some have been retrieved for burial.

Postmortem and burial

"The Government has not stopped the retrieval but most families are financially handicapped and cannot bear the cost of retrieval, postmortem and burial. They lost all their valuables and assets to the gang," he says.

Violet Chebwobi, also a resident of Emia, witnessed the abduction of her husband and co-wife by SLDF members who took them to the forest. Her search for the bodies was unsuccessful until August, last year, when a man led her to a pit.

"I was taken to a place between Chewango and Tendibali and shown a latrine. I removed the shrubs and positively identified my husband and co-wife. There were several bodies in the pit," she says. Chwebwobi says she has had terrible nightmares since then, which she blames on her dead relatives. She says in her dreams she sees them complaining of ‘suffering from cold’ in the forest.

The military has also been accused of using the same tactics as SLDF. Esther Chebet Miti claims her husband was killed by the military and she has not found his body. She claims she saw an army helicopter take his body and that of their neighbour to the forest and throw them in a grave they had dug.

"After my husband was killed at Kapkoto base, I saw a plane at 5pm land in the area and a military vehicle arrived at the scene. Two white sacks were removed from the helicopter and thrown into a pit. A cold chill ran down my spine and I knew that was my husband’s body and that of our neighbour being dumped," she says.

The body of Chebyuk sub-location sub-chief Patrick Kiptemo Sewi has not been found to date after he was allegedly tortured to death by the military.

His wife, Phylis Tamnai, says he had been arrested three times by the army and did not return after his final arrest.

"Some people told me that after he died, the military took the body to the forest. It is not easy to access the place because the military has barred residents from going there," she says.

The executive director of Independent Medico Legal Unit (IMLU) Samuel Muhochi confirmed the existence of graves and caves where SLDF and the military buried their victims. He says his team recovered five bodies in Kamarang Hills, 200 metres from the military base.

Kangaroo courts

"The relatives identified the decomposed bodies from the clothes they had worn at the time of arrest. The bodies were partly eaten by wild animals. We know they were killed by the military and not SLDF according to evidence by the relatives," he says.

The executive director of Western Kenya Human Rights Watch, Job Bwonya, says the SLDF had a kangaroo court in Kamarang Hills where those sentenced to die were killed and thrown into the pits, caves or in the bush. Bwonya says the military adopted the same tactic and threw bodies in the same places to conceal evidence.

"I have been to these areas and the claims are true. People cannot venture into mass graves for fear of reprisals from the military," he says.

But military spokesperson Bogita Ongeri dismissed the claims saying his officers did not kill. He says the accusations are fuelled by remnants of SLDF and NGOs bent on confusing the public.

"The operation in Mt Elgon was the most successful in Kenya’s history. That is why we are building a military base there to ensure peace remains," he says.

He challenged those claiming to know the graves to take him to the areas and pursue the matter legally.