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Nairobi, Kenya – On June 7, Albert Ojwang was visiting his mother and father in his house village of Kakoth in Kenya’s Homa Bay County. His mom had simply served him ugali (maize meal) and sukuma wiki (kale) for lunch when law enforcement officials on motorbikes arrived on the household’s compound.
Earlier than Ojwang might take a primary chew, they arrested him, taking him to the native Mawego police station earlier than transporting him 350km (200 miles) to the Central Police Station within the capital, Nairobi.
The officers informed his mother and father he had dedicated an abuse towards a senior authorities official and was being arrested for publishing “false info” in regards to the man on social media.
Ojwang, a blogger and trainer, had no legal document and was only a month shy of his thirty first birthday. Nevertheless it was a celebration he wouldn’t stay to see as a result of lower than a day later he was useless.
Police stated he died by suicide after “hitting his head” towards the wall of a cell the place he was being held alone. However after an uproar from the general public and rights teams and additional investigation, the declare didn’t maintain up. Ultimately, two law enforcement officials have been arrested.
Nonetheless, the general public anger that erupted after Ojwang’s loss of life didn’t abate.
Kenyans have been on tenterhooks since mass antigovernment protests erupted throughout the nation a 12 months in the past – first towards tax will increase in a finance invoice and later for the resignation of President William Ruto.
Within the time since, police have been accused of human rights abuses, together with allegations of presidency critics and activists being abducted and tortured.
Ojwang was seen by many as yet one more sufferer of a system attempting to silence these making an attempt to carry the federal government to account.
And within the month since his loss of life, offended protests have soared; state violence – and deaths – towards civilians have continued; and younger individuals appear decided to not give in.
‘False and malicious info’
Ojwang was the one baby of Eucabeth Ojwang and Meshack Opiyo, a retired quarry employee who had endured laborious labour for 20 years in Kilifi County to ship his son to highschool.
Opiyo left the back-breaking job after Albert Ojwang had secured a job as a trainer, hoping his son would assist maintain the household after incomes a level in schooling.
“I had just one baby. There’s no daughter. There’s no different son after him,” he informed Al Jazeera. “I’ve suffered … whereas [working] in a quarry in Timbo for 20 years in order that my baby might undergo college and earn a level,” he added, saying Ojwang left behind a three-year-old son.
Ojwang was a promising trainer at Kituma Boys’ Secondary Faculty within the coastal Taita Taveta County, about 700km (435 miles) southeast of his childhood house, his household stated.
Media reviews stated he was linked to an account on X that a number of individuals used to publish information about Kenya’s authorities and politics. That’s what drew the eye of the authorities who got here to his father’s home that June afternoon.
That day, the arresting officers assured Opiyo his son could be protected once they took him into custody. In a single day, the daddy left for Nairobi – taking his land title deed with him to make use of as a surety to bail his son out as a result of he had no different cash. However the information he acquired was of his son’s loss of life.
“I believed we might come and remedy this situation. I also have a title deed right here in my pocket that I had armed myself with, in order that if there have been going to be want for bail, we might speak with a lawyer to bail him,” Opiyo informed journalists the Sunday morning after his son’s loss of life, having simply realized what had occurred to him.
Regardless of police claims that Ojwang died from self-inflicted accidents, his household and the general public have been sceptical. Human rights advocates and social media customers alleged foul play and an official cover-up by police.
As public stress mounted on the police to supply readability, Inspector Basic of Police Douglas Kanja confirmed that his deputy, Eliud Lagat, was the senior official who had made a “formal criticism” that led to Ojwang’s arrest.
“The criticism alleged that false and malicious info had been revealed towards him [Lagat] within the X – that’s, previously Twitter – social media platform. The submit claimed that he was concerned in corruption inside the Nationwide Police Service,” Kanja stated earlier than Kenya’s Senate and the media on June 11.
At first, Kanja repeated to the media that Ojwang had hit his head on the wall, killing himself within the course of. However when questioned by lawmakers within the Senate, he admitted that was incorrect.
“Going by the report that now we have gotten from IPOA [Independent Policing Oversight Authority], it’s not true; he didn’t hit his head towards the wall,” Kanja stated. “I tender my apology on behalf of the Nationwide Police Service due to that info.”
A crew of 5 authorities pathologists additionally launched a report that exposed extreme head accidents, neck compression and a number of comfortable tissue traumas. The reason for Ojwang’s loss of life, they decided, was a results of the accidents, not a self-inflicted incident.
In the meantime, Ann Wanjiku, the IPOA vice chairperson, informed senators that preliminary findings confirmed Ojwang was alone within the cell however two witnesses who have been within the subsequent cell stated they heard loud screams from the place Ojwang was held.
The IPOA report additionally prompt there was foul play on the Nairobi Police Station as a result of CCTV cameras had been tampered with on Sunday morning after Ojwang’s loss of life.
Subsequently, a number of individuals have been arrested and investigated, together with two law enforcement officials who’ve been charged.
Police Constable James Mukhwana, an officer arrested and arraigned in courtroom over Ojwang’s loss of life, informed IPOA investigators that he had acted on orders of his boss.
“It’s an order from the boss. You can not decline an order out of your superior. For those who refuse, one thing might occur to you,” he stated in a press release to the IPOA. He added that his superior informed him: “I would like you to go to the cell and have a look at those that have been in remand for lengthy. Inform them there’s work I would like them to do. There’s a prisoner being introduced in. Deal with him.”
Mukhwana pleaded not responsible in courtroom however stated he was sorry in regards to the loss of life in his assertion, including: “Ojwang was not meant to be killed however to be disciplined as per instruction.”
Who’s ‘sanctioning’ these killings?
Since Ojwang’s loss of life, Kenyan rights organisations have condemned what they are saying is his “homicide”, calling the failure by authorities to carry accountable these liable for police brutality as disrespect for human rights.
“The savage beating to loss of life of Albert Ojwang and the following makes an attempt to cowl this up shatter as soon as extra the status of the management of the Kenyan Police Service,” Irungu Houghton, the chief director at Amnesty Worldwide Kenya, informed Al Jazeera.
“Amnesty Worldwide Kenya believes the failure to carry officers and their commanders accountable for 2 successive years of police brutality has bred the present impunity and disrespect for human rights,” he stated.
Houghton additionally known as for all these implicated to step apart and permit for investigations to happen.
“To revive public confidence and belief, all officers implicated should be arrested. … Investigations should be truthful, thorough and swift. This second calls for no much less.”
Amnesty has beforehand known as out police abuses, together with “extreme power and violence throughout protests”, and reported abductions of civilians by safety forces. Rights teams stated greater than 90 individuals have been forcibly disappeared since June 2024.
“Albert Ojwang’s killing in a police station comes after persistent repeated police denials that the conventional chain of police command will not be liable for the 65 deaths and 90-plus enforced disappearances seen in 2024,” Houghton stated.
“Who’re the officers abducting and killing those that criticise the state? Who’s sanctioning or instructing these officers? Why has the federal government discovered it so troublesome to set off deep reforms to guard relatively than stifle Kenyans’ constitutional freedom of speech and meeting in addition to act on public coverage opinion?” he requested.
Talking in an interview with Kenya’s TV47 on June 24, the Nationwide Police Service Spokesperson Michael Muchiri acknowledged police brutality inside the service, saying it was improper.
“We settle for and we acknowledge that inside our ranks, we’ve gotten it improper a number of instances,” he stated. However he added: “An act by one in all us, and there have been a few them many instances over, shouldn’t in any means be a mirrored image of the entire organisation.”
Al Jazeera reached out to Deputy Inspector Basic of Police Lagat to touch upon the allegations towards him, however he didn’t reply.
Shot at protests
Most of the Kenyans reportedly focused by police and different “state brokers” have been younger, vocal individuals within the antigovernment protests that engulfed the capital and different cities final 12 months.
After Ojwang’s loss of life, the Gen Z protesters as soon as once more erupted in anger.
On June 17, they staged an indication in Nairobi to demand justice for his or her fallen comrade. Issues quickly bought out of hand because the police used power, leading to fatalities among the many younger individuals.
Boniface Kariuki, a masks vendor in Nairobi, was caught between the police and protesters, and the police fired a rubber bullet at his head at shut vary, sending him to an intensive care unit on the Kenyatta Nationwide Hospital. He was declared mind useless after a couple of days and died on June 30.
An post-mortem report launched on Thursday stated Kariuki “died from extreme head accidents brought on by a single close-range gunshot”. It additional revealed that 4 bullet fragments remained lodged in his mind.
Two officers who had been caught on digital camera firing the lethal bullet have been charged.
This got here in regards to the time Kenyan youth additionally marked a 12 months because the antigovernment protests started on June 25, 2024.
Consistent with the anniversary, many younger individuals throughout the nation took to the streets to precise their anger towards the federal government.
These protests additionally grew to become violent. Many companies have been destroyed in Nairobi, and a few police stations somewhere else have been set ablaze.
That very same day, three 17-year-olds, amongst others, have been shot useless in numerous elements of the nation. Whereas the police haven’t commented on the deaths, the victims’ households and rights teams say all three have been killed in crossfire throughout the protests.
Dennis Njuguna, a scholar in his ultimate 12 months of secondary college, was shot in Molo, Nakuru County, as he headed house from college for his mid-term break.
In Nairobi’s Roysambu space on the Thika Superhighway, police reportedly additionally shot useless Elijah Muthoka, whose mom stated he had gone to a tailor however didn’t come again. That night, she would obtain the information that he was hospitalised on the close by Uhai Neema Hospital. He was then transferred to the Kenyatta Nationwide Hospital and pronounced useless the following morning.
Exterior Nairobi in Olkalou, Nyandarua County, Brian Ndung’u was shot twice within the head, in keeping with an post-mortem report launched by pathologists on the JM Kariuki County Referral Hospital. Margaret Gichuki, Ndung’u’s sister, stated her brother had simply accomplished his secondary college schooling and realized pictures so he might assist increase his school charges along with their mom, who’s a every day wage labourer.
“He had gone out to do road pictures, which was his ardour, and that’s the place he bought shot. I used to be house and realized about his taking pictures by means of Fb photos that have been shared by pals,” Gichuki informed Al Jazeera.
Gichuki described her brother as a hardworking younger man who had loads of desires, however which have been minimize quick by the bullet. “After the post-mortem, we couldn’t get additional details about the id of the bullet that was faraway from his head, because the police took it,” she stated, explaining that one bullet was fragmented in his mind whereas one other was eliminated by medical doctors and handed to the police throughout post-mortem.
Along with their cousin Margaret Wanjiku, Gichuki then known as to tell their mom that Ndung’u was lacking – not wanting to right away shock her with the information that her son had died.
“Ndung’u had been pronounced useless on arrival on the hospital, however this was information that carried weight for [our mother], and we needed to have her come house earlier than we might break it aside from inform her over the cellphone,” Wanjiku stated.
‘Surge’ in harassment
Lower than two weeks after that, Kenyans once more took to the streets in demonstrations that when once more turned lethal.
On Monday, they rallied for “Saba Saba” that means “Seven Seven” in Kiswahili to mark the date on July 7, 1990, when individuals demanded a return to multiparty democracy after years of rule by then-President Daniel arap Moi.
This 12 months, the protest was a wider name for Ruto to resign and likewise a second to recollect Ojwang.
4 days earlier, Ojwang’s physique had arrived at his house in Homa Bay for a nighttime vigil earlier than his burial the following day.
When it arrived, offended youth took maintain of the coffin and marched with it to the Mawego police station, the place he was final seen alive earlier than he was taken to Nairobi.
On the station, the youth set the station ablaze earlier than making their means again to Ojwang’s house along with his physique.
The subsequent day on the funeral, Anna Ngumi, a good friend of Ojwang’s, informed mourners: “We’re not going to relaxation. We’re not going to relaxation till justice is finished. Bear in mind we’re nonetheless celebrating Seven Seven right here. We are going to do Seven Seven for Albert Ojwang.”
However on the rallies, police have been as soon as once more heavy-handed. In Nairobi, they fired stay rounds and water cannon on the protesters. Eleven individuals have been killed.
The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights stated individuals have been additionally kidnapped and arrested, including that it was “deeply involved by the current surge in harassment and persecution of Human Rights Defenders (HRDs) accused of organizing the continued protests”.
‘Why did you kill my baby?’
Inside his circles, Ojwang is claimed to have been a humble one who by no means quarrelled with anybody and as an alternative sought peace every time there was a battle.
His college good friend Daniel Mushwahili stated Ojwang was modest and sociable.
“I knew this particular person as a really cool and outgoing particular person. He had many pals. … He was not an conceited particular person, not a bully, and didn’t even take part in harassing anyone,” Mushwahili stated. He was “an individual who seeks peace”.
Ojwang’s mom Eucabeth, talking at a reception by comic Eric Omondi, lamented her son’s killing, saying she had misplaced her solely baby and didn’t understand how the household would cope with out him.
“I had hope this baby would help me in constructing a home. He even had a undertaking to plant greens, so we might promote and make cash. Now I don’t know the place to begin with out him,” she stated.
“I really feel loads of ache as a result of there are individuals who got here house and took my son. … I really feel loads of ache as a result of he’s useless.”
In the meantime, because the investigation into Ojwang’s loss of life continues, his father says he misses his “reliable” son, who he relied on to maintain the household’s most useful issues, even with the little that they had.
Opiyo stated that when the officers got here to their home to arrest his son, they noticed how little the household had and knew they’d not struggle again. In his grief, he stated he now needs solutions from the police and particularly Deputy Inspector Basic Lagat, who made the criticism towards Ojwang.
“As we speak, my son is useless from accidents inflicted by means of beating. I want you to clarify to me why you killed my baby,” Opiyo stated.
“My son didn’t die in an accident or in conflict. He died in silence within the palms of those that have been supposed to guard him.”
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