Lobby tells police to stop Killing, injuring peaceful protestors.

 Kisumu Professionals Forum led by Odhiambo Otieno{seated in the middle} address the press in Kisumu where they have told the police to stop killing and injuring Anti-IEBC peaceful demonstrators-Photo By Dickson Odhiambo.

By Dickson Odhiambo.

October 16, 2017.

Lobby tells police to stop Killing, injuring peaceful protestors.

 A LOBBY Group in Kisumu County has told the anti-riot police to stop with immediate effect killing or injuring peaceful protestors during the ongoing anti-IEBC demonstrations across various parts of the country.

The group known as Kisumu Professionals Forum says police should protect lives and property and should not kill or injure peaceful protestors since peaceful protest is a constitutional right as enshrined in the constitution of the year 2010.

They says police have brutally murdered three peaceful protestors in Bondo Town last Friday but the police have since denied claiming the slain protestors raided a police station within the town.

Speaking in Kisumu during weekend, the Group led by Odhiambo Otieno, Hezron Omondi, Jared Omolloo, Alice Wasinda and Eddy Ogola said since the NASA Coalition called for peaceful protests against the electoral body and its supporters participated in peaceful demos allowed by the constitution across the country, there has been a sense of reckless on the side of the police service through inhuman beatings, murders, robbery and thuggery.

They say that it is quite disheartening that the body charged with the responsibility of protecting lives and loss of property is the same that is now on rampage in Kisumu and other parts of the country where anti-IEBC demos are ongoing.

“For instance in Kisumu last Friday during the peaceful demonstration, boda boda riders who were undertaking their usual businesses were tortured, their clients harassed and their bikes were destroyed by the Anti-riot police who are suppose to provide security to lives and property,” they say.

The lobby says police should provide security to those who are demonstrating peacefully since they have been duly notified for such demonstrations instead of putting the lives of Kisumu County residents at risks.

“It is the police that are now orchestrating this awful behavior. Citizens are now being forced to alight from vehicles and walk in mud especially around Kondele and Manyatta areas,” they add.

 The group has also condemned attacks by the anti-riot police especially the dreaded GSU on a number of journalists while on duty giving coverage to demonstrations last Monday and Friday.

They say the attacks and harassment on journalists is uncalled for and should not be tolerated at all cost.

“It is not only backward but also extremely erodent to the already achieved milestones in the media to torture and block certified journalists from carrying out their work as was witnessed last Monday and Friday,” they further say.

Nyanza regional Police Coordinator Leonard Katana who addressed the press in Kisumu last Friday said police only used minimum force against a section of demonstrators in Bondo town who went to attack a police station within the area.

“What I would like to say is that there was an attack by some demonstrators to a police station in Bondo and police used force,” Katana said.

He says the procedures of dealing with demonstrators are very clear in law and should be applied where possible.

He assured Journalists covering the anti-IEBC demos that they will not be harassed by the anti-riot police in the line of their duties.

“We fully understand the role played by the media and you have a role to perform and what has happened so far is not right,” he added.

ENDS: