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NAIROBI: This week, eight politicians were herded into police cells over hate speech. This raised eyebrows, mainly because the ignominy of spending a night in police cells is the preserve of garden-variety countryside thugs. We can’t comment on the charges, but I must point out that the whole thing made my mind hark back to the 90s. First, to the horror of my first overnight sojourn in a police dungeon. Those dens were tinier, darker and dingier.
And though I’ve never been in remand, I’m told Uncle Moodi Awori, when he happened on the scene, gave them a human face.
Ah, today, I hear they even let in some light through some high-placed ventilation. Back in the day, there were not even old, dusty and moth-eaten rugs for a blanket, or any mildewed length of sponge for a mattress. You simply hunkered down on the cold floor. The small room could hardly pack ten people, but on a good evening it carried a cocktail stench of stale sweat, tobacco and illicit brew from tens of unwashed drifters. A cop would grab you by the collar and hurl you inside like a bag of potatoes, guffawing gleefully as you hobbled over a mass of cursing and kicking humanity curled up in all manner of ungainly positions. If you came in late, the only available spot would be near a small metal drum with a hollowed top. In this ‘toilet’, tens of guests of the state relieved themselves to overflowing. Man, if today’s cells stink, then we cannot find fitting adjectives for the stench of the 90s’ cells. The nightmare of it explains why even innocent people ran like the prairie wind and disappeared into maize plantations at the sight of any vehicle resembling the dreaded Black maria.
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