The lobby seeks a declaration that those forcibly quarantined without sufficient and reasonable cause or prior testing should be released because their rights are being violated.
Muhuri lawyer Lumatete Muchai said it is public knowledge those confined in government-designated isolation centres are subjected to deplorable conditions.
“The restrooms are flooded with water, the food is kept overnight and is rotten and there is no proper planning on the separation of the infected and non-infected,” he said.
Muhuri has sued the Attorney General, the Health Cabinet Secretary and the Police IG.
It wants the government to pay quarantine costs, about Sh2,000 per day plus other expenses.
Muhuri said the government is responsible for ensuring quarantine is carried out while upholding the human dignity of the people confined.
“The circumstances are not peculiar to Mombasa county alone. All over Kenya, similar cases have been reported of people being forced into quarantine as punishment for undisclosed offences,” Khalifa said.
Muhuri said people quarantined at such facilities are at great risk of contracting Covid-19 due to lack of proper sanitation and failure to implement all safety guidelines including separation of the infected and uninfected.
“This will negate the very purpose and reason of isolation and quarantine,” Lumatete said.
(Edited by V. Graham)
