As Christmas festivities gather momentum, four families are mourning after their relatives were murdered by criminals in Nyamira, Manga and Borabu districts in separate incidents.Pastor Orina Momanyi, 60, was killed in cold blood in Nyamira by suspected sungu sungu gangsters.

Mr Momanyi was butchered in his house as his wife watched. Mrs Grace Nyanchama said a gang of four masked men entered their kitchen where they were taking supper at 8pm and killed her husband. “I saw my husband being butchered like an animal by the merciless young men. The killing has traumatised me and my family,” Mrs Nanchama said.

The second killings, which sent shockwaves across Nyaguku Village in Manga District, were those of Ms Jemimah Kemuma, 56, and Ms Alice Makori, 60, who were flushed from their houses and hacked to death.

The two mutilated bodies were later abandoned on a foot path about 500m from their homes. The bodies were discovered with their hands tied to their backs.

It was suspected that the killings were also executed by the outlawed sungu sungu group because the bodies bore deep panga cuts.

Following the brutal killings, residents fear that the gang has begun targeting old women because some people link them to witchcraft.

“We are asking the government to protect us because this gang mostly comprised of youths, is targeting vulnerable people. They should spare us,” an old woman, who did not want to be named because of fear of reprisals, said. Another puzzling killing is that of Ms Caren Ogato, 67, who was brutally murdered on Tuesday night by unknown gang in Gesabakwa Village in Borabu District.

The killing of Mrs Ogato came barely a day after the two elderly women in Nyaguku, Manga District, were killed. Mrs Ogato’s body, which had a deep cut in the forehead and neck, was discovered lying in a pool of blood by her grandchild who was sleeping in a different room.

Manga DC Onesmus Kyata and his Borabu counterpart Mohammed Noor asked the residents to remain calm as police had launched investigation into the killings.