Duale threatens to ditch Jubilee over crackdown

National Assembly Majority Leader Aden Duale Friday threatened to withdraw support for the Jubilee government over what he termed arbitrary arrests of “his people.”

This is the first time Mr Duale, ranked high up in the government pecking order, has made unsavoury remarks about President Kenyatta’s government.

“We stand by the interests of our people. There should be no doubt about that,” Mr Duale said Friday at a rally in Eastleigh attended by over 20 MPs and Senators from North Eastern, Coast and Upper Eastern regions.

He said police were targeting Muslims. “We were elected by the Muslim community and we shall defend their interests,” he said amidst chants from the charged crowd.

“It shall no longer be business as usual. We shall not and will never allow our people to be discriminated against, never,” Mr Duale declared.

Mandera Senator Billow Kerrow accused the government of encouraging youth radicalisation by the way it was fighting terrorism.

“The issue is not the Muslim clerics. They become radicalised through the actions of the government. Makaburi was labelled a terrorist and was under 24-hour surveillance but when he is killed, the government says it doesn’t know who did it,” he said.

The legislators accused officers from Pangani police station of raping women and demanding bribes from suspects for their release.

Nairobi County Commissioner Njoroge Ndirangu, however, said the operation will continue.

“We are not targeting Eastleigh alone. This operation started in Karen in February and will spread to the whole of Nairobi,” he said.