Dusk To Dawn Curfew Declared In Marsabit Amidst Security Operation -Matiang’i

MARSABIT, Kenya, May, 2 – The entire Marsabit County has been placed under a dusk-to-dawn curfew and a special security operation declared in the area.

Interior Cabinet Secretary Dr. Fred Matiang’i said the 6 pm-6 am curfew that will initially last for 30 days with the option of an extension will run in tandem with a disarmament exercise targeting illegal guns and ammunition.

He said the National Security Council had decided to launch “Operation Rejesha Amani Marsabit” following incessant inter-ethnic attacks that have defied peace initiatives and the lapse of the 30-day window sought by county leaders to secure reconciliation.

In the latest incident in Yanish, Laisamis constituency within Marsabit county last week, bandits linked to a local ethnic militia shot dead six people including a Chief and his assistant and wounded four others.

“The security challenges in Marsabit have been by far recently the costliest in our country. You know the lives of the leaders and our ordinary citizens that we have lost as a result of these challenges. We in the security sector are counting losses almost every other day because of these challenges. We will stay on this operation until sanity prevails and until we stop the senseless loss of lives in that county.”

The animosity between the Borana and Gabra communities has progressively boiled over, and Matiang’i has expressed concerns over political leaders who have frustrated previous attempts to pacify the area.

According to the CS, rival groups have been armed and transformed into competitive political militias meting out violence on innocent civilians in what has become one of the costliest security challenges in the country.

“The leaders in that area have been less than truthful, and none is innocent. Each one of them accesses illegal firearms because they’re in the neighbourhood of a conflict area and a conflict region, and they have constantly taken advantage of that to arm large groups of bandits and thugs. The unfortunate result has been the loss of lives of innocent people.”

Addressing the media at the General Service Unit Headquarters, Ruaraka, the CS also ordered an immediate ban on unlicensed mining activities in the Kom region of Merti sub-county of the

neighboring Isiolo county. A security operation will be launched in the area to flush out criminals hiding in the mines.

Flanked by Interior PS Karanja Kibicho, Inspector General of Police Hilary Mutyambai, senior security chiefs, and the chairman of the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC) Rev. Dr. Samuel Kobia, the CS said intelligence reports pointed to a nexus between the illegal minings and the funding of conflicts in Marsabit and other crimes including terrorism activities.

The operation by security teams drawn from the GSU, the Rapid Deployment Unit, the Quick Response Unit, the Anti Stock Theft Unit among others will also be extended to Sololo area where suspected Oromo Liberation Front militias are active.

“You may recall that just recently our security forces intercepted a huge cache of explosives in Merti. Those explosives were meant for Nairobi. They were being moved by a terrorist cell, and that route has become worrisome to all of us over the recent years. I cannot count the number of times our police officers have disrupted planned terror activity that is being channeled through that route.”

The Government will also dispatch more relief food and water to Marsabit. The county has experienced long spells of drought and famine that have wiped out large herds of livestock which is the economic mainstay of many residents.