By Standard Team
More leaders and organizations yesterday joined calls on
Police Commissioner Maj-Gen Hussein Ali to resign over the Kisumu weekend
bloodbath.
The National Muslim Council of Kenya supported Orange
leaders who established a fund for the victims.
Nazlin Omar Rajput, the council’s chairperson, said
Ali and Cabinet ministers Raphael Tuju, John Michuki and Kiraitu Murungi
should be held responsible for the deaths.
They urged Ali to quit as the Law Society of Kenya
pledged free legal services for families of those killed by police during
the skirmishes last Saturday.
"Ali lied to the public that those who were killed
were trying to attack a police station. The truth is that they were shot
in the back while running away from the police," Rajput said.
She said she had seen the bodies of those killed and the
wounds showed that the bullets entered from the back.
She claimed 13-year-old schoolboy Paul Mwela, who was
among those killed, was shot at close range and not by a stray bullet as
claimed by the police.
Launching the fund at the Orange secretariat yesterday,
Roads minister Raila Odinga said the team had donated Sh100,000 and asked
for more donations for medical and burial arrangements.
Raila said the killing of four people and shooting of
over 30 others was inexcusable.
"A constitution written in the blood of innocent
Kenyans, however attractive, is not worth its name and we call upon our
supporters to express their wishes peacefully," said Raila, reading
from a statement signed by ministers Kalonzo Musyoka, Ochillo Ayacko,
Najib Balala, MPs Uhuru Kenyatta, William Ruto and former vice-president
Musalia Mudavadi.
Raila called on Maj-Gen Ali and Internal Security
minister John Michuki to resign.
He said Maj-Gen Ali was a military officer picked from a
barracks and did not know how to lead the police.
"The work of the military is to kill those who
invade a country and that of police is to protect life and property. He
should go back to the barracks and stay there because he is not trained in
policing."
He termed as "stupidity and an insult" claims
by Maj-Gen Ali that police shot at a group that attempted to raid Kondele
police station to rescue a suspect.
He said the victims, including the schoolboy, were
killed about 5km from the police station.
Maj-Gen Ali had said his officers were justified to
shoot at the mob because of the attempted raid and that the boy was killed
by a stray bullet.
Raila said experts were on the ground to investigate how
the victims were shot before instituting court proceedings against the
Government.
He said police were not allowed to use live bullets
against unarmed civilians and wondered why police had not shot those
attacking Orange campaigns.
In Nakuru, Law Society of Kenya chairman Tom Ojienda
said his organisation would assist in legal action against the police
officers, the Commissioner of Police and the Government.
He called for the arrest of police officers who killed
the four people during campaign chaos.
He called on Maj-Gen Ali to identify the police officers
involved.
In a statement released in Nakuru, Ojienda said the
Government should display a high level of responsibility, especially
during the period of the campaigns.
"LSK expresses its deep outrage and condemns the
senseless acts of shooting and murder of civilians in the Kisumu
chaos," said the chairman.
"It is not sufficient for the commissioner to say
taht the shooting arose out of provocation. Police had other ways of
arresting the situation," the LSK boss said.
Meanwhile, two Kisumu Polytechnic students are still
admitted to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) at the Aga Khan Hospital
following the weekend riots.
Three others were in the hospital wards and five others
were recovering at the New Nyanza General Hospital in different wards.
Nyanza provincial hospital medical superintendent Dr
John Odondi said the hospital discharged two patients yesterday.
The sister in charge at Aga Khan Selina Omollo said the
polytechnic students in ICU were out of danger. |
