My heart is broken in two. Baringo county is still sitting on the edge. Tears and blood continue to gush out, drenching the width and breadth of the expansive county leaving its hills and valleys in a crimson hue.
This is an intensely personal experience. This is the reality of evil.
In spite of all the efforts by the security agencies, the bandits of Pokot are still daring, blood-thirsty vampires and armed to the teeth. We don’t need quantum physics to know that the bandits have the most sophisticated weapons.
Tiaty constituency has for decades been used as the launching pad for deadly attacks meted out on the Tugen, Illchamus and the Ndorois. These three bear the brunt of the well-choreographed killings just because they are the neighbours of the community that produces, nurtures and arms their sons to ambush, steal and destroy without an iota of provocation.
So, it happens that, the bandits killed four people last week. The killers repeated their modus operandi when they waited for the Interior CS, Kithure Kindiki to land in Loruk and then attacked the neighbouring Ng’aratuko village, killing a herder in cold blood. They took off with his head of cattle.
This particular killing is the straw that broke the camel’s back. The residents are livid and are demanding for answers from their political leaders, CS Kindiki and security agencies. Unfortunately, the answers have not been forthcoming.
Instead of owning up to their laxity, they went for the jugular of a journalist working with a national TV station for his sins of reporting accurately on a broad daylight attack on the Kenya Defence Forces camp at Kapindasum Primary School. Though the KDF were got flat-footed, they put up a good fight and averted what would have been another massacre. Pupils were got up in the ensuing melee as bullets flew over them.
This arrest of NTV’s reporter Ken Ruto shouldn't have happened -not in this Kenya of ours boasting a constitution so progressive it frowns upon and prohibits arbitrary arrests. The scribe’s arrest is what stirred the hornet's nest as residents protested, demanding his immediate and unconditional release of the reporter.
The residents accused the local DCI office for training their guns on the reporter instead of the bandits roaming freely on the rugged plains and hills of Tiaty waiting to murder another Tugen or Ilchamus just to prove a point.
After the release of the journalist, the local DCI nabbed a civil servant, Morwess Cheleiwo, over allegations that he demeaned CS Kindiki in his social media posts. Local politicians say he spewed vitriol and uttered unprintable words at a presser as he pleaded with the powers that be to end banditry forthwith.
These arrests have only emboldened the people who are now calling out their national political leaders for sitting on the fence when it comes to insecurity issues. They accused the legislators for allegedly being behind the arrest of Morwess.
Social media was lit as the residents worked their fingers dismissing the politicians’ participation in a recent peace caravan ostensibly held to sensitise bandit territory of Tiaty on the negative effects of their favourable hobby of killing for sport. Who on earth advised on this? Peace caravan for bandits? Really?
If the old files on banditry sordid past were to be dusted down, the body count would exceed 10,000, not to mention injuries, displacement, livestock theft and sheer destruction of lives. The Pokot community is expanding its territory as their MP William Kamket calls for a new devolved enclave known as Tiaty county.
Politicians are the ones driving this vice for political and economic expediency. Stolen livestock is seldom recovered. Where do they go? Of course, the slaughterhouses dotting our cities and towns. Some are exported to the Middle East.
Politicians suspected of being behind the attacks appeared for the umpteenth time before the DCI sleuths recently for interrogation only for them to be released until the next attacks. We can’t do this and expect to stop the attacks. This amapiano dance should produce results.
Why are the security agencies playing ping-pong with our lives? We can’t live like rats all our lives. Our call for peace will never fade.
Kindiki, give us guns or we look for them ourselves. Something must give.
The writer is a journalist and media consultant
@djebett