- Natembeya said a meeting of elected and opinion leaders for the three counties will be held within the next 10 days to chart the way forward on the insecurity.
- Schools in the region will also be provided with two armed police officers to ensure children's safety.
Image: MATHEWS NDANYI
The government will send a team of officers from the Rapid Deployment Unit to carry out a security operations in Kerio Valley where bandits killed four people including a widow and her two children.
Rift Valley regional coordinator George Natembeya visited the region and said the operation covering Elgeyo Marakwet, West Pokot and Baringo will start within two weeks.
“Those who have been perpetrating attacks will now feel the full force of the law,” Natembeya said, adding that the masterminds of the attacks have been identified and would be dealt with.
The regional coordinator said a meeting of elected and opinion leaders from the three counties will be held within the next 10 days to chart the way forward on the insecurity problem in the region.
Schools in the region will be provided with two armed police officers to ensure children's safety.
“We will also upscale our community engagement activities in the region so that we involve residents and county leadership in finding lasting solutions to the banditry problem,” he said.
Natembeya visited the family of widow Caroline Kemboi and her two children, Jeptoo aged 14 and Kiprono 12 years, who were shot dead by bandits last Saturday.
The children were pupils at Liter and Sambalat primary schools respectively. He pledged government support to the family.
Endo ward agricultural officer Benjamin Sum was also shot in the head at Kapkobil along Tot-Chesongoch road just a kilometre from his Tot work station last Saturday.
The regional coordinator said criminals who carried out the killings were being tracked.
The three counties are considering suspending development projects in Kerio Valley and redirect resources to the insecurity problem following the killing of the four people.
Elgeyo Marakwet Governor Alex Tolgos said they are in discussion with his West Pokot counterpart John Lonyangapuo and Stanley Kiptis of Baringo to stop development projects in the region and hire National Police Reservists to help protect communities.
More than 20 people have been killed in two month, Tolgos has decried the deteriorating insecurity in Kerio Valley and now wants President Uhuru Kenyatta to personally intervene to stop the loss of lives.
They latest victims were shot dead in Kapen area by bandits who did not steal anything, Tolgos says the killings indicate that it’s no longer about cattle rustling.
“When they kill schools children, a mother and an officer who were not armed and did not have cattle, can that still be about banditry? This is a different issue,” Tolgos said at a media briefing in Eldoret.
The county boss said the government had suspended the police reservists programme in the region but they want it revived.
“We know the government was not able to pay the reservists but now we are saying they hire the NPRs, counties will use their resources from suspended projects to pay them,” he said.
Tolgos said security chiefs had not implemented measures suggested at previous security meetings in the region and they now want the government to recruit and deploy the NPRs immediately.
“It has reached a point where we no longer care about development in the region. What we now want is to secure the lives of our people as a priority because county projects can wait,” he said.
He spoke as the Kenya National Union of Teachers threatened to withdraw teachers and children from the schools in Kerio Valley region over the insecurity.
Elgeyo Marakwet Knut executive secretary John Cheberi said many children and teachers had lost their lives through banditry attacks in the region and it was impossible for learning to go on under an insecure environment.
He warned unless measures are enforced to end banditry, they will ask teachers to shut down schools for their safety and that of children.
Tension remained high in the region following the latest killings.
The killing sparked off protests from professionals from the Marakwet community and women who accused Interior CS Fred Matiang'i and his security team of failing to tame banditry in the region.
The professionals led by Laxaman Kiptoo said more than 20 people had been killed in the last two month and that the 12 hours night curfew imposed in the areas was only working to the advantage of bandits.
“Our security teams are unable to deal with the insecurity problem in Kerio Valley and we are asking the government to deploy KPR so that they can help protect our people,” Kiptoo said.
Additional security officers were deployed in the affected area to help restore calm.
“For how long will our people be exposed to such suffering yet we have a government that is supposed to protect all of us?” area Senator Kipchumba Murkomen posed.
-Edited by SKanyara