Human Rights Organizations Raise Flag over Police Killings of 24 Youths

Police have shot dead 24 people in three weeks in Dandora, Kayole, Mathare, and Majengo according to locally based human rights organizations.

The 24 include ten people in Mathare North, six people in Dandora, four in Majengo, two in Mowlem, and two in Kayole.

Police Reform Working Group and Social Justice Centre have raised concern over the increased cases of extrajudicial killings especially in informal areas and are calling on the government to stop the killings.

“We wish to express concern over the increasing cases of death from police use of lethal force. Over the past one month, incidences of torture and extrajudicial executions implicating police officers have sharply risen,” said Mathare Social Justice Coordinator, Gacheke Gachihi.

The organizations document killings by police officers in the informal areas and present the cases to Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA) for further investigations and prosecution of the rogue cops.

Gacheke Gachihi, in a joint statement, at the Dandora Community Justice Centre, revealed that the rogue cops are known to carry out executions in public places and in broad daylight and are therefore well-known to the area residents.

Most of the extra-judicial victims range between 14 and 24 years of age, they include students, whom some were expected to sit KCSE exams, and youngsters who completed secondary education around three years ago but could not afford to further their education. These victims also include youngsters who drop out of school to engage in crime.

Gachihi referred to the killing of three students in Dandora on 28th October and that of a 25-year-old Evans Odhiambo, who was a mechanic. Evans was picked from Mathare North Hospital on 26th October by armed police officers, only to be found dead at the City mortuary with seven glaring gunshot wounds the following day.

According to Article 26 of the constitution, every person has the right to life and a person shall not be deprived of life intentionally except to the extent authorized by the constitution. Cases of extrajudicial deaths continue to increase year in and one cannot help but wonder, can we trust our officers to ensure security? Has our justice systems failed to force the officers to take matters into their own hands?