As lines are drawn, where do influencers and artists land?

There is an amplification of online protests by celebrities and social media influencers [Photo: Shutterstock/Instagram/Courtesy]

Blogger Edgar Obare was supposed to appear in court on 2 November 2020. He was accused of sharing confidential travel documents of YouTuber Natalie Wanjiru Githinji alias Natalie Tewa, back in July,2020. But Obare never showed. It later turned out that he had allegedly been abducted by police officers.

“Three men approached me and asked me my name. Then they quickly held me by my pants and took me to a waiting car,” narrated Obare. He recounts how he was handcuffed, blindfolded and ferried to an unknown location. The blogger says the law enforcers attempted unsuccessfully to get him to unlock his phone, denied him water and even drugged him. “They decided to strip me naked in the car, by tearing all my clothes to my boxers,” his statement read in part. He added that they took explicit pictures of him, naked while further humiliating him and asking him why he breaks families. They badgered him, wanting to know who pays him for the exposes he is notorious for. Obare was finally thrown out of the car in thorny bushes, and he discovered he was in Nyeri.