A section of elders from Garissa have strongly condemned the killing of a 40-year-old man in Adheile in Raya location, Sankuri division, Balambala sub-county over the weekend.
Mohamed Abdi Hassan a father of eight was shot dead as he was walking through the farm by lone gunman.
The body was first taken to the Garissa Referral Hospital for mortem before it was released to the family for burial in accordance with the Islamic rites.
Speaking to the press during the burial in Garissa Town, Hamud Sheikh an elder from the community regretted that this is the second incident to happen in less than two months and yet nobody has been arrested.
“It is unfortunate that two months ago we lost two people in the hands of the gang which demands to know which clan one comes from before they kill. When you identify yourself, they either kill or leave you depending on your clan,” he said.
Hamud said that that despite the names of those suspected to be involved in killings having being availed to the security apparatus, no arrest has been made.
“When they killed our people, we sat down with the community where the killers hail from and we accepted to be compensated Sh. 1 million and even before they paid the agreed amount they are at it again, surely if this is not provoking us what is it,” he said.
Mohamed Daud urged the security apparatus to handle the matter with the urgency it deserves noting that failure would aggravate an already bad situation.
“We are a peace loving people and we don’t want to take the law into our hands. That is why we don’t want to retaliate. Let the government bring the killers to book,” he said.
Garissa Peace Committee Secretary Hassan Osman condemned the incident and called on the two communities of Abduwak and Aulihan to peacefully co-exist.
“We are yet to know the motive of the killer and we feel the police and the CID must bring the killers to book. We would not wish to see a further escalation of ethnic hostilities,” he said.
Speaking to KNA on phone, Garissa Sub County CID boss Michael Njeru confirmed the incident saying that police recovered one spent cartridge from the scene.
Njeru said the cartridge had been sent to Nairobi for ballistic examination.
The CID boss said that four people have so far recorded statements in connection with killing. He appealed to anyone with information related to the investigators to avail the same to the police.
By Jacob Songok
