Man jailed 20 years for terror links to cleric Rogo, Osama

The late Sheikh Aboud Rogo at a Nairobi Law Court where he attended the hearing in a case where he is accused of incitement to violence. [File, Standard]

On August 27, 2012, Mombasa-based cleric Aboud Rogo, who was known for extremist teachings, was killed while driving his wife to hospital.

Twelve years later, George Olucho Awiti was found guilty of terrorism after being nabbed by police with Rogo’s audios.

Oluoch was also arrested with videos promoting Mujahidin that had been linked with the revered terrorist Osama bin Laden.

Siaya Senior Principal Magistrate Lseter Simiyu on Friday handed Oluoch, who was also known as Abdul Bnajib Mohamed, 20 years in jail for being a member of a terrorist group and collecting information relating to terrorism.

The story of how Oluoch got caught up by the long hand of the law started in a house next to Hawinga Mosque, Siaya County.

 A police informer notified the authorities about Oluoch’s activities. This led them to his house, where they got two mobile phones and a SIM card.

The items were handed to the counter-terrorism police unit, but the officer who was to scrutinise them died.

A second officer took over the investigations and conducted a forensic probe. The videos and audio were found in Kiswahili and English, with short interludes in Arabic.

In court, Oluoch did not deny that the phones were his. Instead, he gave a different story of who he was.

He told the court that he was born into a Christian family and was raised as such. He testified that his parents died, after which he converted to Islam in 2008.

 Oluoch said that he was a congregant of Hawinga Mosque until the police arrested him. He said he was helping out an imam or a religious teacher, although he had no formal training.

 He admitted having Rogo’s teachings and further told the court that if anyone was caught with them, then he would be deemed to be radicalising as opposed to teaching Islam.

In one of the videos, some people chanted in Kiswahili and Arabic. The chants were composed of questions on why Islam believers would agree to be under a pagan government. At the same time, they were being urged to join jihad and fight the Kenyan government. The video ended that the remedy for a pagan is the sword.

In another video, the maker was prompting the use of guns to achieve ‘martyr’ status. The maker claimed that true salvation was by using a gun, and one should not be afraid to be killed or die in jail.

There were also Rogo’s recitals encouraging jihadism on a claim that those who die will be go to heaven and given virgins.

The Director of Public Prosecution Renson Ingonga, through Nina Opiyo (Senior Prosecution Counsel), Gideon Kiprono Kibiwott (Prosecution Counsel), and Evans Soita (Prosecution Counsel), argued that all eight videos were encouraging people to join Al-Shabaab, kill non-muslims, and kill Sheikhs who do not ascribe to jihad.

In his reply, Oluoch claimed that other videos were Christian and music on the same phones that had yet to be presented in court.

“I have evaluated the evidence on record and also listened and watched the compact disc and considering the undisputed content stored in the compact disc as was exhibited in open court in the presence of the accused, it is clear that all content is of extremist Islamic doctrine orientation.

‘‘I find that all the three counts are proved beyond reasonable doubt and the accused is convicted,” ruled Simiyu.