Are we children of a lesser God? Are we lesser citizens? Are the people running Jubilee government humane?
These are among many questions posed by IDPS mostly of Kikuyu ethinicity who have been camping at Parliament buildings for the last month.
This was until Wednesday morning when “security and hired goons” allegedly descended on them with clubs and bundled them into buses, dumping them in Nakuru.
Justus Nyang’aya, Amnesty International Kenya country director, has condemned the violent eviction as “irresponsible, inhumane and an injustice that portrays the government as uncivilised”.
“This is not how a government should treat its citizens, any functional government should be responsive to its people’s cries and needs. It should protect, not humiliate and brutalise them,” he said.
The IDPs are returnees from Uganda who had walked to Nairobi to seek audience with the President over unfulfilled promises over their resettlement and compensation.
Richard Kimungoi said hundreds of officers led by Devolution ministry officials only identified as Macharia, Wafula, chief Wanjau, a DC and DO raided their makeshift tents at about 3am.
Kimungoi said they were woken from their sleep, clobbered and “thrown” into waiting buses.
“Some of our members managed to run away, but they rounded up 35 who were suffering multiple fractures and injuries as a result of beatings. We were transported to Nakuru,” he told the Star in Nakuru.
“When we reached Nakuru we were told to disembark without our belongings so as to go for short calls and have rooms booked for us. But upon alighting the buses zoomed off and left us here stranded.”
He said the buses were hired from KIMA Sacco and that their registration numbers were KCC 130 Y and KCH 659 N.
Kimungoi said the evictees ended up losing the documents they had and that some suffered broken jaws and ribs during the operation. The Star could not verify this.
“The least we expected was for a government that duped us out of Uganda, where we were staying as refugees and promised to facilitate us with land and cash to start off our lives, to deploy police vigilantes in the wee hours of the morning to descend on us with blows,” he said.
The man said the action by the government showed they were wrong to expect its protection.
“We thought what we have been through since the post election violence in 2007-2008 – the displacement, our return to Kenya, the trekking to Nairobi and even our month-long camp at Parliament – could touch the leadership of this country,” he said.
In 2014, President Uhuru Kenyatta urged refugees who had fled PEV to return to the country as normalcy had been restored.
In April the next year, Ugandan and Kenyan authorities signed an agreement for their smooth return and resettlement.
But Kimungoi said what they were promised did not come to pass.
“The verification was done for three months by officers from the Devolution ministry led by the same Macharia and the Department of Refugee Affairs. We were promised land, Sh400,000, IDs and the replacement of vital documents for our children,” he said.
“But upon crossing the border from Tororo to Malaba, we were only given Sh100,000 and promised that the rest would be sent to us and the land given.
He said their attempts for talks with the government have been unsuccessful.
Nyang’aya noted the IDPs were picketing peacefully so the government should have accorded them dignity and respect, listened to them and facilitate their resettlement.
Devolution CS Mwangi Kiunjuri didn’t respond to questions on the eviction whereas government spokesperson Eric Kiraithe could not be reached.
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