National Assembly Majority Leader Kimani Ichung’wah contradicted himself on Thursday as he struggled to justify the excessive use of brutal force by security agencies and rising cases of abductions in the country.
Ichung’wah, who appeared for an interview on Aljazeera’s ‘Head to Head’ programme, initially said there were no reported cases of abductions in the country, but later acknowledged midway through the programme that the President William Ruto-led government was investigating cases of abductions.
“I believe there are no cases of enforced disappearances perpetrated by the state in Kenya and not in this age and time. We have an administration and for the first time the President committed that never again will such a thing as abductions, disappearances and collection of bodies from River Yala and any other place take place in the country,” Ichung’wah stated.
When confronted with the facts about the number of abductees, the Majority Leader later said that the government was actively investigating the cases of abductions.
“There are cases of abduction as to who is abducting the people, that is the biggest question. They say the police but the police say they are not the one. What we do in a country that has institutions that work is to allow them to do the investigations and get to check who has abducted who,” he later said.
During the heated session, Ichung’wah also lashed out at Public Service Cabinet Secretary Justin Muturi stating that who he was on him way out of the Kenya Kwanza government.
“The minister has his reasons to lie. Justin Muturi is probably on his way out of government and he is a politician who has a personal beef with the president. There are reasons why Justin Muturi was removed as the Attorney General around the time of the elections. It is a matter that is under active investigations,” he said.
The show host also confronted him about comments he made last year in Bungoma, where he claimed that the abductees had locked themselves in Airbnbs
“The context was the misconception that every abduction in the country was carried out by the security enforcement agencies in the country. People who had broken the law on computer misuse should be judged in the court of law and the agencies have no business abducting people. It is not all cases that were out of abductions. Someone was in an Airbnb but they reported themselves as abducted. There were cases of political conspiracies where politicians were involved,” he said.
The Majority Leader also acknowledged that President William Ruto’s government is unpopular and that the President is working hard to turn some things around.
“It is true what you are saying and the perception out there is that the government is unpopular. That is nothing uncharacteristic of any administration two years after winning an election especially an administration that came into office on the backbone of a dilapidated economy but that will change in due course,” he added.