Two injured in Marsabit bandit attack

Story by MUCHEMI WACHIRA Publication Date: 1/19/2007

A homeguard and a herder were seriously injured yesterday when a group of bandits attacked them in Marsabit District. Halkano Huka and Wario Boru were immediately admitted to Marsabit district hospital with bullet wounds, following the dawn raid on Origir Village, 15 kilometres away from Marsabit Town. Mr Huka was shot in the left side of his hip while Mr Boru was shot in his right thigh. “I was in my boma (livestock shed) when I saw about 200 bandits coming. They were armed with AK-47 rifles. I fled for my life but they managed to shoot me,” Mr Huka said from his hospital bed. Later repulsed The two victims were later transferred to Nairobi. They arrived at the Wilson airport at 7.30pm and were received by the Red Cross rescue workers in two ambulances. They were taken to Kenyatta National Hospital. Doctors at the hospital said their condition was stable and they were out of danger. Mr Huka said he also had his gun but could not use it since the bandits attacked abruptly. He explained that the bandits were later repulsed by a group of homeguards before they could take away livestock. “They re-grouped and started exchanging fire with them,” Mr Huka said. Renewed fighting Yesterday, Marsabit area police boss Francis Sang and his team spent most part of the day hunting for the attackers. Tension was high in Marsabit Town yesterday as people saw the attack as renewed fighting between two rival communities. Fighting between the two communities had been going on for the last two years. It subsided last year after four MPs from the area died in a plane crash as they flew to the district to discuss modalities of ending the conflict. Since the dead MPs were replaced in a by-election in July last year, peace had prevailed in the district until yesterday. According to Saku MP, Mr Hussein Sasura, 10 people from the neighbouring North Horr constituency, who had attacked a Manyatta on Wednesday evening, were repulsed before regrouping and staging yesterday’s attack. This was the third attack in the past two months.