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Sungu sungu: Three Kisii districts in fear over bizarre killings

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Published on Monday, 23 July 2007 08:13

Ms Nyarangi Ratemo hopelessly, but steadily stares at the distant hills, which she believes hold the secrets of her son’s brutal murder two months ago.It was into these bushy hills standing lazily on Menyinkwa village that the killers of his son disappeared.

"Why did they have to kill him? He was just a labourer and had no grudge against any one," she sobs. But even more painful is that the gang suspected to have killed her son will not allow her to bury him. Members of the group had warned her against collecting the body at the Kisii District Mortuary.

"They killed him and warned me not to bury him. How can I throw my son away like that?" she asks.

Shadowy gang has spread terror

Yet Ratemo is not mourning alone. Several families suspect the murderous vigilante calling itself ‘Sungu Sungu,’ butchered their loved ones. The shadowy gang has spread terror in Kisii, Nyamira and Gucha districts, and left a trail of destruction. Residents believe it has killed 100 suspected witches and robbers.

They kill and dictate how and where their victims are to be buried, residents say. Investigations by The Standard indicate that close to 50 people so far killed by the vigilante have been buried outside their ancestral homes on the orders of the gang.

Families across the three districts have had to bear more pain when bodies of loved ones lie at mortuaries for months because the gang could not allow their burials.  Others with no alternative burial sites have opted to inter at the Kisii public cemetery.

Gang also murders those who report them to police

A cemetery attendant told The Standard there was increased demand for burial spaces. Apart from killing suspected criminals and witches, sungu sungu also murder those who report them to the police.  "Here people don’t mourn. If they (sungu sungu) hear you have complained to either police or the Press, they will kill you," says Ratemo, fidgeting and looking over her heaving shoulders to ensure no one is listening.

"Those boys will come back and kill us for talking ill of them. They killed my innocent son and they warned me not to bury him here. Now he is dead and there is no grave. We had to bury him at a relative’s home," she said.  She suspects her son was murdered by his jealous age mates who were envious of "his stable family". Her husband, Mr Benson Ratemo, a primary school teacher, had no words to describe the incident.

A kilometre away, Ms Gladys Kwamboka, a wife to another victim, the late Josephat Ayacko, is in tears. "My husband was yet to pay dowry to my parents. How do I move on? No dowry and no husband to lean on. We were yet to get a baby and now they have killed him," the bitter widow says.

Family defied a ‘do-not-bury-at-home’ warning

Partially blind, Mzee John Bairi, 90, is led to his two grass thatched houses as he mourns his son, killed just a day before The Standard team visited.  Bairi too is agonising over where to bury his son, having got a warning from the gang not to dare bury him at home.

"They are saying we should not bring him home for burial. Let them decide what they want to do with it," the nonagenarian says, staring hollow. In Bobasi constituency, the family of a former senior police officer, Mr Zachary Getui, is grappling with yet another bizarre killing of their loved one.

The late Getui’s daughter, Ms Beatrice Nyambune, a magistrate, stares at her father’s fresh grave. This family defied the gang’s ‘do-not-bury-at-home’ warning. "My father knew the law and was a good source of information to the Provincial Administration. The criminals ganged up, killed him then branded him a criminal too," Nyambune says.

She says like other families they received leaflets warning them not to bury at their Gionseri home. "We knew our father was not killed by the so-called vigilante group, but a hired gang out of jealousy by some people in the neighbourhood," she said.

Gang is threatening to exhume body

The warning: "The body of deceased criminal Zachariah should be buried at the Government cemetery, failure to, you will server [sic] the consequences." The gang is now threatening to exhume the body, although his family says neighbours denied he was a suspected criminal.

At Gianchere village in Nyaribari Chache, the family of David Mose, a former accountant, had just buried their son’s body at the cemetery on the orders of the sungu sungu. "There is no grave for my first born son. His major crime is a case he had just won in a Kisii court," said a relative who asked not to be named. The gang warned Mose’s family not to speak about the murder, threatening to "come for our heads if we complained".

"I strongly suspect that the killers had something to do with that land case, but since he has died, we leave it to God," said his widow.

Gang chops off the victim’s private parts

Residents are alarmed that the gang has hatched a trend where it chops off the victim’s private parts unlike in the past when body parts of criminals were left intact. In one of the leaflets, the gang is asking the wife of the victim to "surrender his weapons to the police".

They are also instructions that "the remaining criminals" surrender their weapons and themselves to the area chief or to the nearest police station, or suffer "the same fate". Why? The gang says: "We want a clean society free from crime."  Residents are now asking why the police cannot stop the orgy of killings. "We are still waiting and we hope they will show up and help us unmask the killers," Nyambune said.