University of Nairobi students protest MP Babu Owino's arrest

Embakasi East MP Babu Owino Photo:Courtesy

University of Nairobi students were Thursday engaged in running battles with General Service Unit riot busters as they protested the arrest of Embakasi East MP Babu Owino.

A former student leader, Paul Ongili alias Babu Owino was arrested over alleged abusive remarks on President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Officers at the DCI headquarters were ordered to study the clip that captured the said utterances for possible action.

Babu Owino was later re-arrested moments after his release by a Nairobi magistrate court.

Police said Mr Owino was to be charged with assault, an offence he allegedly committed when he was vying for the Students Organisation of Nairobi University (SONU) chairman’s seat in 2016.

The MP had just been released on a Sh500,000 bail and two sureties of Sh1 million each.

He is facing charges of subversion and offensive conduct as well as an alternative charge of incitement to violence.

The case will be mentioned on Wednesday October 4, 2017.

Owino’s lawyer, Siaya Senator James Orengo, was addressing the youthful MP's supporters outside the court when undercover police officers who were waiting, snatched the legislator from the court’s basement.

Police had to fire tear-gas canisters at the crowd after it turned rowdy on learning that Owino had been rearrested and driven away.

"I have been re-arrested by flying squad officers who are holding me at Pangani Police Station," wrote Owino on Twitter.

Meanwhile, the embattled MP risks losing his parliamentary seat after a petitioner against his election filed an application seeking to strike out his response to the petition.

Mr Francis Wambugu Mureithi (Jubilee Party), who filed election petition against Mr Owino, says the response to petition had been filed out of time and therefore should be struck out.