Kakamega elders: Destruction, revenge killing are a must for peace

Maclaine Naomi ponders her next move at Mutonyi village in Lugari after her house was torched (Benjamin Sakwa/Standard)

In Kakamega, elders maintain no one can stop the cultural practice of doing retaliatory attacks that involve torching the houses of the murder suspects, destroying their belongings including crops and animals, and those belonging to their relatives.

Not even a contingent of police or hired goons can stop the culture.

"If there is proof that someone has committed murder, our tradition demands that his house be razed down and he be excommunicated. A member of his extended family can sell the land and give him the money to settle elsewhere far away from the community," says Alila Atanas.

Atanas, however, says it was wrong for villagers to burn a church owned by one Mackenzie, a murder suspect from Shinyalu.

"Burning a church is unacceptable. Those who did so could run mad," he says.

At Emayala village in Mumias East Constituency, police were overwhelmed when they tried to prevent angry residents from storming the home of one of the locals after he was accused of being involved in the murder of his brother.

The armed police were forced to stand at a distance and watch eight houses being set on fire to ashes.

Musa Were from the village maintained that the arson incident is in line with the Luhya culture.

"When a person is killed by another one either knowingly or unknowingly and the suspect is known, the only way to bring back peace in the family and community is to do a revenge attack that involves burning all the properties belonging to the suspect to exorcise the killer spirit," said Were.

Simon Okumu, another elder, said there must be a loss and damage in the community when a person is murdered, the same way the community has lost a life and the damage is to burn the houses of the suspect.

"In this case, we must drive out the evil spirit from haunting the family or the community or causing more deaths and the only way to exorcise evil spirit and appease the dead is to torch the houses where the murder suspect stays," said Okumu.

"When such a thing happens, the community will cut off links with the suspect's relatives. If the suspect's families happen to remain and stay with the rest of the community, they will not share food, water or have any form of association with the members of the society.

"This is to prevent spreading the evil spirit in the community and save it from being haunted by the spirit of the dead," Okumu said.

Joel Oketch opined that the community will never experience peace if the arson and retaliatory attack is not done.

He says the attack should happen immediately and nothing should be stolen.

"Based on our culture, a retaliatory attack is a must and it is something normal to the community. That is why it must be done. For the revenge to be successful, everything in the house is destroyed," said Oketch.

"All crops should be also destroyed, cattle are either killed or burnt and any house or property belonging to a person who is related to the suspect should be also destroyed or burnt," Oketch added.