MRC, tribal gangs target police at Coast

By Philip Mwakio and Stanley Mwahanga

The Government has said 26 police officers have been killed in the line of duty at the Coast this year alone. 

The officers died in violence partly perpetrated by the outlawed Mombasa Republican Council (MRC) and other tribal gangs.  Coast PC Samuel Kilele tabled the list that also includes former Changamwe OCPD Senior Superintendent of Police Otieno Owuor, Chief Inspector Salim Chebii (Changamwe) Police Corporal Stephen Maithya, Police Constable Andrew Songwa, who died after an attack by alleged members of MRC on the eve of elections in Miritini, Mombasa.

Until last year’s massacre of 42 policemen in Suguta Valley in the Rift Valley, Coast Province held the dubious credential of being a killing field for policemen and other security officers. Statistics for Coast grew grimmer late last year, when reports emerged that AP Reuben Kinywa deployed to fight raiders who attacked Kipao village on December 21, was missing.

The Provincial Administration in Tana River disclosed that Mr Kinywa “has not been accounted for but they are doing all possible to find him,” amid reports the officer could have been killed by enraged villagers and his body burnt at Kipao. To date, senior police officers and provincial administration officials refuse to discuss Kinywa’s fate or whether there is, in fact, any search going on to recover him or his remains and gun if he is indeed dead. Tana Delta DC David Kiprop disclosed on December 27, the officer was missing but neither divulged his name nor the circumstances under which he died.

Rising suspicion

Rotich disclosed his name only last week but declined to state any other details. But there is rising suspicion the officer could have been killed by enraged villagers who have accused police of slow response to the December raid and massacre of more than 30 villagers.

Meanwhile, human rights agencies have claimed the villagers killed and burnt an assailant in police uniform. Police watched helplessly as the villagers in Kipao village burnt the corpses of 10 slain villagers and two other injured attackers found in the bushes, a day after the said raid.

Statistics indicate most officers killed in Coast Province in 2012 died either trying to end militia violence in Tana Delta of Tana River County, quelling radical protesters and terrorists in Mombasa or at the hands of separatist militiamen in Kilifi and Kwale Counties. In recent times, more policemen and security officers have been killed or injured, as compared to rioters or demonstrators especially in Mombasa during the bloodletting that followed the August 27 killing of radical Islamist Sheikh Aboud Rogo.

In these riots police told reporters, they were either under-supplied or given contradictory orders by their superiors that made them sitting ducks at the hands of rioters.

Several officers have not only lost lives, limbs but also weapons, arousing fear among the locals and the police force, with some Government officials opting to flee from their homes for fear of being the next target. But Coast Provincial boss Aggrey Adoli said police work was always risky, arguing the officers in those areas could have been ambushed while on duty.

“The deaths were accidental, they could have been ambushed and it does not mean they were not equipped because these are occupational hazards,” explains Mr Adoli.

On October 17, last year, Eric Kipyego Chesang, an anti-terrorist police officer was blown to pieces at the Majengo Mapya area of Likoni as he was trying to detain two terrorist suspects who also died in two grenade explosions and gunfire that followed. And on October 15 last year, suspected MRC members killed Salim Changu, the chief of Kombani location, Kwale County, a few hours after the capture of MRC leader Omar Mwamnwadzi.Coast PPO stated in earlier interviews the Constitution was a challenge to the police since, he claimed, the officers are not allowed to use live bullets.

Security officers have quietly complained that they are increasingly becoming exposed to death and violence to lack of equipment and proper orders from their superiors.

This argument became common following the September 9 killing of nine policemen at Kilelengwani in the Tana Delta, apparently by machete wielding militants in the context of the Orma and Pokomo tribal war.

Rights violations

Deputy Police Spokesman Charles Owino claimed policemen who have in the past been accused of human rights violations now needed “Cabinet approval” to use force for fear of “being dragged to the Hague,” referring to the International Criminal Court where former Police Commissioner Hussein Ali was hauled to the ICC after police were accused of killing civilians in the 2007/2008 post election violence.

Mr Owino was roundly condemned for insinuating that police are impotent.  The slaying of the officers in the Tana Delta remains a mystery to date, for the Government has not explained how well trained officers could be massacred by machete wielding attacks without shooting any of them dead. The massacre issued from a combination of carelessness, incompetence and lack of adequate back up of the forces at Kilelengwani who had been in the bushes for two weeks separating warring tribes. Autopsy findings showed they were all slashed in the back of their heads. Adoli claimed they fired at their attackers but no spent cartridges were found at the scene. Police advanced a theory that police killed 32 attackers who were carted away by their colleagues but never gave evidence of blood or where they were buried.

Some reports suggested that the officers lacked adequate ammunition, cars and food as well as intelligence as a theory emerged that on the fateful day the guns of the slain officers’ lacked firing pins, suggesting sabotage by infiltrators.

In private security officers controlling riots in Mombasa after the August 27 killing of radical Islamist Sheikh Aboud Rogo complained that there was a deliberate break down of orders and chain of command and that police officers who were brought in from Nairobi to quell the chaos were poorly housed and fed, they slept little and were ordered not to shoot, even with rubber or warning shots even when under attack, a claim Adoli vehemently denied.

As if the death of the Kombani chief was not enough suspected Islamists hurled a grenade at Ng’ombeni chief Hassan Omar Gari late November after suspicion that his office had supplied intelligence on recruitment to the Al Shabaab militia.

On September 13 Police Constable Dishon Mwadoe was beheaded in Tiribe in Kwale County by a group youths who were said to be undergoing paramilitary training and oathing in Dzombo forest.

“The officers was said not to be armed during the operation since he was from a morning exercise when he received a tip off and decided to accompany his colleagues that’s is when he was maimed,” said Kwale AP Commandant Paul Muthee.

On October 4, last year, Harrison Mweni Maitha, a 54 year old GSU officer was hacked to death in broad daylight at Mtomondoni near Mtwapa as he guarded Fisheries minister Amason Kingi. Before the Mtomondoni event the greatest carnage of security officers had occurred in Kisauni in Mombasa on August 30 when three prisons officers were slain and dismembered on August 30 when rioters lobbed a grenade in a truck they were travelling in as they tried to control riots that followed the August 27 killing of radical Islamist Sheikh Aboud Rogo in Mombasa.

In these deadly riots, a civilian was beheaded, churches burnt or looted and four policemen hurt.  The human rights group has come under attack for being mum following the attacks of police officers, with the civil society groups condemning the rights body of being biased in fighting for justice.

Adoli expressed concerns that the human rights activists could be working to please their financiers since they don’t value the lives of security agents. “I haven’t seen anywhere in this country where a police man or security agent has been valued.  They are treated as if they are animals, yet they are human beings with families,” he added.