KHALID: The mass graves of Kericho: A nation numbed by death and silence

On March 20, chilling reports emerged from Kericho that should shake the conscience of any nation that claims to value life. Government vehicles were allegedly spotted at Kericho Cemetery.

In a disturbing turn of events, local young men were reportedly hired to dig what would later become a mass grave. Soon after, bodies were brought and dumped into the freshly dug pit. Preliminary reports indicate that up to 14 bodies were interred at that site.

If this were an isolated incident, it would still be horrifying. However, it is not. According to the same young men who operate around the cemetery, such burials are not new. They spoke of previous occasions - quiet, unmarked, and unaccounted for - where bodies were buried in groups.

Unconfirmed accounts point to one grave containing seven bodies and another holding as many as 16. These are not mere statistics; they are human beings - lives lived, stories untold, families left in anguish.

Perhaps most disturbing of all is the realisation that this is becoming a pattern in Kenya. We have seen this before. Last year, the country was confronted with the horrifying reality of the Kwa Binzaro mass graves, where over 30 bodies were exhumed under disturbing circumstances.

In 2024, Kenyans woke up to the grotesque discovery at Kware dump site in Eastlands, Nairobi, where dismembered bodies of women were recovered. Police reports indicated that at least 42 women had been murdered and discarded like waste in this case.

Just a year earlier, in 2023, the nation was plunged into shock by the Shakahola massacre, where over 400 followers of a cult died from starvation in what remains one of the darkest chapters in our recent history. In 2022, the Yala River bodies scandal saw at least 30 bodies retrieved from the river - many bearing signs of torture.

Each of these incidents, on its own, should have triggered a national reckoning. Together, they paint a terrifying picture that Kenyans are dying in unexplained circumstances and their bodies are mutilated, hidden or dumped in the most inhumane ways imaginable. Mass graves are quietly being dug, filled, and forgotten. The sanctity of life, the very foundation of any civilised society, has been eroded to alarming levels.

We are becoming a nation where death is normalised, where horror no longer shocks and where the dignity of the human person has been stripped away. As a country, we are traumatised.

We are constantly being treated to gruesome, real-life stories of dismembered bodies, secret burials, and unexplained deaths. Families are left searching for loved ones, often only to find them in morgues, rivers, forests or shallow graves. The psychological toll of this reality cannot be overstated. It is a collective wound that continues to deepen with every new revelation.

Yet, in the face of all this, the silence from those entrusted with our security is deafening. Where are the answers to these heinous acts? Where is the accountability?

In any functioning democracy, each of these incidents would have triggered immediate investigations, public disclosures and most importantly, consequences. Senior officers would have resigned.

Others would have been dismissed. Institutions would have been forced to account. But alas, not in Kenya. Here, the pattern is painfully predictable: shocking revelations, brief public outrage, promises of investigations and then silence. No answers.

No accountability. No justice. This raises a troubling question: is it negligence, indifference, or something far more sinister?

The continued failure to hold security agencies, including the police, accountable suggests either a lack of political will or, worse, complicity. It suggests that those in positions of power are either unwilling or unable to confront the rot within our institutions. In that failure, the burden shifts to the people.

Kenyans are being left to fend for themselves in a system that no longer guarantees their safety or dignity. When the state abdicates its responsibility, the people must rise. We must refuse to be numb. We must demand answers. Not tomorrow, not eventually, but now.

Who are these bodies in Kericho? Where did they come from? Who authorised their burial? Why are mass graves becoming a recurring feature in our country? These are not optional questions. They are urgent demands.

We must also demand independent investigations into all these incidents from Kericho to Kwa Binzaro to Kware to Shakahola and to Yala River> We must ensure that those responsible, regardless of their rank or position, are brought to justice.

As a people, we must become our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers. We must speak out, organise, and push back against a system that has grown comfortable with death and silence.

Civil society, the media, religious institutions and every concerned Kenyan must come together to demand accountability if we do not, we risk becoming a nation that buries its dead not just in the ground, but in secrecy and impunity.