Supporters of MP and minister clash

Jamhuri day celebrations in Bomet District were on Monday disrupted when police fired gunshots to separate supporters of a minister and an MP who were stoning each other.

Trouble started at 2.40pm when Chepalungu MP Isaac Ruto escorted by a convoy of motorcycle riders clad in UDM party caps tried to gain entry into the Bomet Green Stadium, the venue of the celebrations as the area district commissioner Elija Kodoh was reading the President’s speech.

They were met by supporters of assistant minister Beatrice Kones who repulsed them.

According to Bomet police boss George Ali Losku, Mr Ruto’s bodyguards fired in the air to scare off supporters of Ms Kones.

After the incident, the minister called for respect among leaders and accused Mr Ruto of witch-hunting and character assassination.

Mr Ruto, on the other hand, claimed that Ms Kones and councillors allied to her had stage-managed the incident to show him in bad light.

Tension had been building up from Sunday after reports that Mr Ruto intended to attend the celebrations with his supporters.

Elsewhere in Rift valley, an administrator revealed that the government had started profiling internally displaced persons, who were ignored in 2007.

Rift Valley PC Osman Warfa said the exercise had so far identified 1,200 victims, whose names were initially missing in government records.

IDPs resettlement

Early this year, the government announced that there was an estimated 9,000 IDPs yet to be resettled.

Mr Warfa was reacting to complains by the National Cohesion and Integration Commission, which had claimed that the government-sponsored resettlement programme was selective and discriminatory.

“During the previous profiling exercise, some names were omitted but we are reviewing the programme to make it fair,” Mr Warfa said during yesterday’s Jamhuri Day Celebrations at Afraha Stadium.

In Nyahururu, DC Lucy Mulili said squatters residing at a prime plot allegedly owned by a former district commissioner will be relocated to a new plot in the town.

In Kitale, the administrator, Mr Wilson Wanyanga, said that the government had planned a high-powered security meeting at Turkwel to end boundary disputes between the Pokot and Turkana communities in the area.