Family of police officer missing in Haiti sues State

Missing police officer serving under multinational security support in Haiti, 34-year-old Benedict Kabiru Kuria. [File, Courtesy]

The family of the missing police officer in the Haitian peacekeeping mission has moved to court to force the government to explain his whereabouts and condition.

Benedict Kabiru went missing in Haiti on March 26 this year, but the State has remained silent on whether he is alive and if he is still with his Kenyan counterparts who were sent to deal with Haitian gangs. 

His mother, Jacinta Wanjiku, his brother Phillip Kamau, and his uncle Daniel Ndung’u have now sued the Attorney General Dorcas Oduor, Inspector General of Police Douglas Kanja, National Police Service Commission, Interior Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen, and the Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi.

They are seeking to get answers from the officials and their employer (National Police Service), arguing that the continued silence has caused them untold pain and suffering.

According to the trio, Kabiru was recruited as an administration police officer and trained at Embakasi Administration Police Training Centre, after which he was posted to various stations, including Busia, Garissa, Mandera, Marsabit, Boni Forest, and Moyale, where he served in the Border Patrol Unit.

They said that he joined the Multinational Security Support Mission to Haiti on July 15 last year. “He went in the second contingent in accordance with the orders issued by the Government of Kenya,” court papers filed before the High Court in Nairobi read in part.

 They assert that their kin was healthy and was communicating with his family about his safety and work until March, when he went quiet following online claims that he had been captured by a gang that allegedly attacked an armoured vehicle that he was said to be in.

According to them, the Director of Operations at police headquarters dismissed the claims as fake news propagated by social media, adding that the senior officer subsequently went silent when they pressed him to reveal Kabiru’s whereabouts.

They said that they had knocked on doors and called all who were responsible for their kin’s well-being in Haiti, but no one had given a truthful account or a straight answer to their questions.