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Controversial blogger Robert Alai has been arrested over publishing ‘sensitive story’ and detained at Kamkunji police station on the morning of 18 August.
According to the blogger, armed officers from the Special Crimes Prevention Unit ordered him out his vehicle at gunpoint before driving him to Kamukunji police station.
"They blocked the road and ordered me out at gun point. I was then bundled to another car and driven to Kamkunji police station where I am since 10 am on Friday," Alai stated.
While confirming Alai’s arrest, an officer who requested for anonymity stated that a senior person in “society" had complained over a story the blogger wrote recently.
The controversial blogger has a long history of arrests:
In 2012, he was arrested and questioned after the then government spokesman Dr Alfred Mutua complained to CID saying Alai had been “peddling” rumours on the social media linking him to the killings of human rights activists Oscar Kingara and Paul Oulu.
In February 2014, Alai was yet again arrested following social media posts regarding grabbing of land belonging to Langata Road Primary. His arrest came after a businessman (name withheld) had complained that Alai had “wrongly linked him to the land” in several social media postings
Alai was yet again arrested in December 2014 and charged with undermining the presidency. This was after the blogger referred to President Uhuru Kenyatta as an “adolescent president” in a Tweet.
Following his arrest, other bloggers have taken to the internet calling for Alai’s immediate release under the hashtag #FreeAlai.
