Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Former MP sues over Moi era detention


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Former Alego Usonga MP Otieno Mak’Onyango in court on September 29, 2009. He has filed a case against former President Moi over his arrest and detention after the 1982 attempted coup.
Photo/FILE Former Alego Usonga MP Otieno Mak’Onyango in court on September 29, 2009. He has filed a case against former President Moi over his arrest and detention after the 1982 attempted coup.
By NATION REPORTER
Posted  Tuesday, July 5 2011 at 21:17
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A former MP claims he was illegally detained and tortured because of a newspaper article he wrote on the death of politician JM Kariuki.
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Mr Otieno Mak’Onyango told a Nairobi court that he and other reporters investigated the disappearance of Mr Kariuki and wrote a story that he was actually dead.
While giving evidence in a case he has filed seeking compensation for unlawful detention, Mr Mak’Onyango said he wrote the story when he was a reporter for The Standard newspaper.
According to the former MP, the story contradicted the government position, that Mr Kariuki was away on a business trip in Lusaka, Zambia.
That position had been delivered in Parliament, a day earlier, by Mr Daniel arap Moi, who was Vice-President and Home Affairs minister at the time, he added.
“On the same morning that we carried that story, my editor called me and asked me how sure I was,” Mr Mak’Onyango, told the court.
“The Vice-President’s office called me and threatened me. He (Mr Moi) wanted us to retract our story,” he added.
He told his editor that he “stood by the story” and it could not be retracted.
He also alleged that on the same day, as he was covering Parliament, Mr Charles Njonjo, then Attorney-General asked him what he had been up to with the story.
“Then he warned me: ‘Mak’Onyango, with this so-called investigative story you are going to pay dearly one day’,” he said.

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