In Kenya, extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances carried out by police are down slightly, but the figures remain damning, according to the annual report on the issue released Wednesday by Missing Voices, a coalition of human rights organizations. man. In 2023, these cases of police violence will decrease by around 15%.
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With our correspondent in Nairobi, Gaëlle Laleix
Artists, victims and associations came, once again this year, to denounce the impunity of the Kenyan police. Pénina lost her husband in 2013, arrested for an altercation during a family reunion. She found him at the hospital the next day. “ He was beaten everywhere. His face was covered in bruises. My husband died due to internal bleeding and head trauma. They drowned him while they beat him. He was beaten by a police officer who tried to blame another detainee. I filed a complaint against the police, it was hard, I had to be placed under judicial protection. They tried to kill me “, she says.
According to Missing Voices, 118 cases of extrajudicial executions were counted in 2023. That is twelve fewer than the previous year. However, Happy Olal, the coordinator of the Centers for Social Justice, doubts this decline. “ I think there are still extrajudicial killings, but the methods have changed. For example, the Nairobi police use people to kill in their place, it’s mob justice. It is not counted as extrajudicial executions since it is the crowd. Every government has its own killer cops and its own strategies. It is the criminalization of poverty “, he believes.
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According to the Missing Voices report, despite all the cases of extrajudicial killings reported last year, only five police officers were arrested. “ These figures above all reveal the systemic violence suffered by poor populations in the Kenya », tempers Happy Olal.
According to the report, men between 19 and 35 years old are the most vulnerable to this police violence which occurs especially in Nairobi. Most extrajudicial executions are carried out by shooting, either during anti-criminal operations or during the repression of demonstrations. Enforced disappearances, for their part, have been reduced by half. They intervene during anti-terrorist operations. Their reduction of more than 50% also leaves skepticism. “ The police may have found a more discreet way to execute their victims “, we can read in the report.
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