Robbers kill five in petrol station raid

Five workers were killed in cold blood after eight gangsters raided a Total Petrol Station in Naivasha on Sunday night in the latest violent robbery targeting fuel station attendants across the country.

The gangsters armed with mallets, clubs and crowbars, also stole more than Sh1 million after clobbering their victims to death during the 2am attack that is believed to have lasted two hours.

This was the most horrific attack on petrol station workers in the last two months. On December 2, four people were killed during a raid on an Astrol petrol station in Nairobi.

By late last evening, police said they had arrested a suspect who was assisting with investigations.

First to be killed were three male workers who included a pump attendant, a grounds man and a night guard who were hiding in a small room. The gangsters used two huge stones to smash the glass door after which they bludgeoned the three to death.

They later raided the station’s cafe where several other workers were on duty. There, they hacked two women who were working in the kitchen. The two were found in a pool of blood.

The gangster’s first victim was Abel Moranga Tonga, a guard with Seagull Ventures security firm who was in his 50s. He was not even meant to be on duty on the ill-fated night. He was, in fact, standing in for a colleague who had asked to be excused to attend to a personal matter.

“He was stationed at the petrol station as a day guard after joining the Seagull only six months ago,” his supervisor, Mr Lawrence Muchiri, told the Nation Monday.

One of the women victims was a 22-year-old cashier at the restaurant. Her husband, Joseph Njau, identified her as Ann Wanjiku Chege. She had barely worked at the restaurant for two months.

Bernard Kanyara Mwangi, a groundsman by the day and tyre repairer by night, was also among the victims. Mwangi, who was in his 40s, was in a room sheltering from the cold when he was clobbered to death. He was among the employees who had worked longest at the service station.

Martin Waititu, 26, was a pump attendant. He had been transferred from another Total petrol station in Naivasha Town and had worked at his new station for a less than three weeks when he met his death.

The thugs are reported to have broken into a strong room door where they stole the cash and other valuables.

Four workers survived the night of horror. One, a chef Kelvin Musyoka, sustained head injuries and was being treated at the Naivasha district hospital.
The other, a barman Simon Kimani, said he had been dozing after business slackened.

He was awoken by one of the gangsters who was banging on the fridge.

“I shot up, only to be confronted by four men wielding mallets. They menacingly demanded for cash and mobile phones and I surrendered more than Sh8,000 in night sales and my mobile phone,” he said.

He was then forced into the kitchen where he found his colleagues in a pool of blood. He hid in the restaurant until police arrived in the morning.

The other two survivors were women. Both sustained soft tissue injuries and were treated and discharged.

Mr Joseph Gichoya, who owns the petrol station, said he was informed of the attack by one his workers.

“I arrived to find the workers dead. It is very tragic,” he said. He said the gangsters had stolen more than Sh1 million but the actual amount was yet to be established.

The officer commanding the Naivasha police division, Mr Charles Kortok, said: “We are at the initial stages of the investigation and we cannot say much.”

Hundred on Naivasha residents jammed the mortuary to see the bodies of the five and the attendants had a difficult time controlling the crowd.

Tension was high in the town as residents demanded that security be beefed up.

Meanwhile, the Nakuru county government has promised to foot the medical bill for those injured in the attack.

Last year, the National Private Security Workers Union had proposed that security guards be allowed to carry firearms when on duty because they were exposed to serious crimes like robberies.

The union had argued that arming guards would help them thwart attacks. Security guards in Uganda routinely carry guns.