40 more suspected goons arrested in Homa Bay

Homa Bay Police Station, where the suspected goons are being held. [James Omoro, Standard]

At least 40 youth suspected of being goons who held a demonstration to protest against the arrest of Abdi Kassim Sebo have been arrested in Homa Bay County.

The youth have been arrested through operations conducted by police between last Friday and Monday this week.

The youth held the protest on Thursday night soon after the arrest of Sebo. Sebo, who is an ODM youth leader, was arrested alongside seven other youth who attempted to block police from arresting him at Homa Bay Bus Stop.

After their arrests, the youth staged demonstrations in Homa Bay Town on Thursday night. They also resumed the demonstration on Friday morning.

The demonstrations paralysed business activities in the Town on Friday morning.

Traders were chased from their business premises at Homa Bay Municipal Market and other shops in the central business district of the town until police intervened a few hours later.

The business community in the county suffered huge economic losses during the demonstration.

The majority lacked time to operate their businesses because the violence forced them to close their premises prematurely.

What was appalling was that the goons took advantage of the demonstration to break into people’s business premises. They looted goods, causing serious economic drawbacks among many traders in the county.

The protesters also lit bonfires on the road. Some of them ended up destroying street lights in the central business district of Homa Bay Town.

In an effort to restore sanity in the county, police are undertaking a serious crackdown on the suspected gangsters who allegedly committed the criminal act.

Police have been conducting the raid after containing the Friday morning demonstration.

Homa Bay County Police Commander Lawrence Koilem said they will not spare people who breach peace in the county.

“These youths committed serious crimes of looting people’s property, besides other damages. None of them will be spared,” Koilem said.

Koilem told residents to give police time to deal with the criminals.

“We arrested some of the youth with pangas and other crude weapons. The crackdown will continue for the whole of this week to ensure all the criminals are arrested,” Koilem said.

The goons were detained at Homa Bay Police Station. The police boss said all the suspects will be arraigned in court.

According to Homa Bay County Directorate of Criminal Investigations Officer Jimmy Kisobo, Sebo was arrested over two offences.

The first one was failure to report to court after being arrested and released on cash bail in early August.

“There was a time we arrested him over an assault and he was released on cash bail on condition that he would report to court. But he did not do so until the court issued an arrest warrant,” Kisobo said.

The failure led to the issuance of an arrest warrant against Kassim.

The second offence was regarding the violence which occurred during the Linda Mwananchi rally on August 16. The violence led to the destruction of Homa Bay Tourist Hotel ahead of the Linda Mwananchi rally that took place on August 16.