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Police Disperse, Arrest ‘Mungiki’ Members
allafrica.com
Armed police yesterday dispersed members of the outlawed Mungiki sect who were addressing a Press conference in a Nairobi slum.
The Mungiki members took to their heels and leaped over a barbed wire fence as advancing police shot in the air.
Ten people were later arrested.
The Mungiki leaders called the Press to the Mathare slum to protest at the recent shoot-to-kill order by Central PC Peter Raburu, who had accused Mungiki of being behind a wave of crime in Maragua.
The sect members, led by their spokesman Njuguna Gitau Njuguna, condemned Mr Raburu’s order and threatened him with dire consequences if any of them were shot.
Said a defiant Mr Njuguna, who was flanked by a handful of his supporters carrying placards: “We will not go down like chickens. We have been accused of being thieves and murderers without any evidence adduced. We are now mobilising our members to fight back because we don’t believe in turning another cheek when provoked.”
Mr Njuguna claimed that the sect had lost 50 members so far, but did not elaborate on whether they were arrested by the police or attacked by the public.
He demanded that Mr Raburu should tell him under what law he issued his September 1 edict that police should “act ruthlessly” against criminals, whom he claimed were hiding within the illegal sect to commit murders and robberies.
He told Mr Raburu the Police Act was clear that any suspect must be arrested and charged in court.
The open-air protest was held outside a hall made of corrugated iron sheet in the middle of the sprawling slum, opposite Mathare Mental Hospital. It attracted a large crowd of Mungiki members and residents of Mlango Kubwa, who watched and listened keenly.
But the meeting was cut short by police gunfire as Mr Njuguna was saying: “We are going to mobilise all the Mungikis to fight back because of this suppression. We will not turn the other cheek, if they use violence and guns on us we will also use the same on them.”
Chaos reigned as the Mungiki spokesman and his supporters jumped over a barbed wire fence surrounding the compound and ran for safety.
The police, led by the Pangani deputy police boss, Insp. Stephen Lelei, had earlier laid an ambush around the venue and moved in 10 minutes later as Mr Njuguna was reading his statement.
They later confiscated placards saying “Mungiki Most High, Enemies of the Wicked,”, a copy of the Nation and a copy of a novel titled James Madison: Statesman and President, by an American author, Regina Kelly.
Mr Njuguna had earlier denied claims by some politicians, whom he did not name, that Mungiki was the military wing of the Democratic Party of Kenya, one of the affiliates of the National Rainbow Coalition (Narc), led by President Kibaki.
Mr Njuguna accused Environment minister Kalonzo Musyoka and other politicians of seeking to eliminate the outlawed organisation because they feared that it would frustrate their political ambitions.
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