Hooligans demolish picture exhibition

By PETER ATSIAYA

Chaos marred an exhibition of post-election violence pictures in Kisumu town.

The exhibition by Picha Mtaani at Kenyatta Sports grounds was disrupted by a group of goons who stormed the venue and started destroying the pictures.

It took the intervention of anti-riot police officers led by Kisumu OCPD John Mwinzi to save organisers of the event led by Mr Boniface Mwangi from the rowdy youths.

Trouble started when councillor Isaiah Onyango ordered Mwangi to stop the exhibitions, saying it was opening healing wounds. "These exhibitions are causing more harm to Kisumu people than good. You must remove them or we pull them down," Mr Onyango told Mwangi.

An argument ensued before the youth started destroying the pictures displayed on bars.

Healing process

A quick intervention by police officers stopped the hooligans from causing further destruction.

Mr Mwinzi urged Mwangi to stop the exercise and remove all the pictures to avoid chaos.

Mwangi condemned the incident, adding the healing process could not realise fruits because people pretend they have forgiven each other.

"We started the exercise peacefully at around 9am and the response from residents was good before the civic leader came in and incited youths to disrupt the exhibition and destroy our material," explained Mwangi.

He noted that they faced a similar resistance from councillors in Eldoret, but wananchi overruled them and allowed the event to proceed.

"Police tried in vain to stop the exhibition in Nakuru. Kericho was the most successful town because more than 1,000 people attended the exercise," said Mwangi.

He noted that the group had made 1,500 copies of DVDs, which they were distributing free of charge to people in areas they hold the exercise.

"We are in the process of coming up with 10 million books containing pictures of PEV images to give out free of charge," he explained.

"We cannot reach everyone with this exercise that is why we want to send our message through books and DVDs," he added.

He said they provide guidance and counselling to people affected by the images.

Mwangi said the exercise targeted youth, who suffer after being misused by politicians to cause chaos.