Strong force lands in ‘Valley of Death’

By JOB WERU and MICHAEL SAITOTI

A hardened team of military and police units are combing Suguta Valley searching for heavily armed cattle rustlers that killed over 40 officers on Saturday.

The team is made up of units of the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF), the Rapid Deployment Unit (RDU) of the Administration Police and the paramilitary General Service Unit (GSU).

A senior police officer commanding one of the teams said threeKDF attack helicopters deployed from Kismayu in Somalia would be stationed at Baragoi in Samburu County and Lokichar and Lokori in Turkana South.

The operation has created massive panic in Turkana South and Central constituencies after reports of the deployment reached the villages.

MPs from Turkana County called a press conference to condemn the use of the military in the operation.

Labour Minister John Munyes, Assistant Minister for Forestry and Turkana South MP Josphat Nanok and Turkana Central MP Ekwee Ethuro criticised President Kibaki for ordering the operation.

They said the President “will take full responsibility” as the Commander in Chief for any human rights violations that will be wrought on innocent people in the region, including torture.

Legal battle

“This military deployment is ill-advised because it is a testimony that our internal security apparatus have failed and innocent people are running away from their homes and schools out fear of the military,” said Munyes.

Ethuro also opposed the deployment: “To send the military to Baragoi is to overthrow the Constitution. Parliament has also not given a go ahead for the military to be deployed.

“We are prepared to launch a legal battle in any court of justice locally and internationally,” said Ethuro.

Nanok asked: “Why were the Kenya Defence Forces not used when innocent Turkanas were massacred recently at Todonyang by suspected Merille bandits from Ethiopia?”

The MPs called for the immediate resignation of the Acting Head of Public Service Francis Kimemia as well as Police Commissioner Matthew Iteere for the mess that led to the killing of 42 officers.

They said the mission was poorly planned and executed, claiming that “Samburu warriors” were allowed to be part of the “partisan” police operations against the rustlers from the Turkana community.

But a cross section of leaders from the Samburu community and area residents expressed their joy as the army touched down in Baragoi to deal with the bandits.

Meanwhile, rescue and recovery operations continued in Suguta Valley Thursday, leading to the recovery of four more bodies of police officers as two policemen were found alive five days after they came under sweeping gunfire from the heavily armed bandits. The army team operating from Kisima airstrip in Baragoi was Thursday navigating its way through the rugged Naturkan terrain as they descended into the Suguta valley to join police search teams.

A total of 160 officers from the RDU had been deployed at Naturkan to provide cover for those involved in the deadly mission.

In Samburu, questions were asked as to how the raiders managed to know that the operation had been planned and that the police officers had been deployed for the operation leading to the ambush by the bandits.

Officers carrying out the operation claimed there was a leakage from a remote GSU camp in Baragoi division leading to the attack, a claim denied by senior police officers in Nakuru.

“It was agreed that the officers were to go to the area specifically to reinforce the team in Baragoi and were not there to carry out any dangerous operation as happened,” said a source at the Rift Valley Provincial headquarters who asked not to be named as he is not authorised to comment publicly on such matters. 

Another source in the police who also requested anonymity said a security meeting resolved to deploy the officers drawn from various formations of the Kenya Police Service to reinforce the security team in Baragoi following increased cases of bandit’s attacks.

Shielding raiders

The contingent comprising mostly of youthful recruits left for Baragoi from Nakuru on November 6 under the command of a senior operations officer in the province.

Unlike other operations coordinated from the provincial headquarters, the squad operations were mainly run from Baragoi command.

Thursday, tension gripped several villages in Turkana County, after KDF personnel and their counterparts from various police commands began streaming into the area to flush out the bandits.

Apart from ferrying personnel to the region, the three military helicopters were also laden with sophisticated military hardware.

Police officers involved in an operation that recovered the four bodies said one was badly mauled by wild animals.

A security source told The Standard one of the bodies was badly mutilated, noting that only the head was intact.

The source told us that among the bodies found were that of a senior AP officer stationed in Samburu.

“The bodies were recovered inside the sprawling Suguta Valley, and they will be airlifted to Nairobi,” said the source. And as the recovery was made, The Standard witnessed three military choppers arrive at Kisima and Baragoi airstrips, where KDF personnel then boarded trucks headed for the dreaded ‘valley of death’.

This occurred as a group identifying itself as Samburu professionals accused their Turkana counterparts of shielding raiders who killed an estimated 47 security personnel.

The group claimed Turkana professionals, led by Dr Ekuru Aukot were against the operation.

Aukot was quoted saying the operation was not a solution to the problem that has gripped Samburu county, leading to Saturday killings.

In Baragoi and Maralal areas, fear reigned after word went round that raiders had attacked some policemen dispatched to recover bodies in Suguta Valley.

But Rift Valley PPO Mr John Mbijjiwe and his AP counterpart Mr Douglas Karanja dismissed the claims as rumours.

“I am in a meeting at the moment and I have not received such a report,” said Mbijjiwe.

Karanja in a short text message to The Standard noted: “...that is news to me. Could you check from your source and let me know when and where, please.”

Police spokesman Eric Kiraithe said that no such contact between security forces and bandits was reported Thursday although four bodies of police officers previously reported missing were recovered.

exodus of criminals

Tension also reigned Maralal and nearby Marti and Loikas village, after it was claimed that residents of various areas targeted in the military operation were sneaking to the areas for fear of reprisals by the military.

But a police source said necessary measures were in place to avert an exodus of criminals to the villages.

“We are alert and have distributed security personnel in all those areas to screen anybody who could migrate to the villages,” said the officer.