A fifth youth who had allegedly been abducted at the tail-end of 2024 was on Monday let go by their alleged abductor/s.
Cartoonist Gideon Kibet, alias Bull, said he was abandoned at dawn somewhere in Luanda, Vihiga county on Monday, January 6, some 350km away from his Kikuyu home area where he was allegedly abducted.
On the day he went missing, Busia Senator Okiya Omtatah said he had just left his office in Upper Hill where they had a meeting.
Upon his release, Bull said he had received numerous calls from people, including the senator, with the lawmaker saying the popular social media influencer credited for creating silhouettes critical of the government let him in on how he was abducted.
“I had the joyful honor of speaking with Kibet Bull on the phone this evening. He sounded like a soldier triumphantly coming back from the frontline and not a subdued or disheartened individual. He briefly narrated to me how he was abducted,” Omtatah said.
According to the senator, Bull said after he left his office, his driver dropped him at the Archives in the CBD, from where he boarded a bus to Kikuyu, where the alleged abduction took place.
“The kidnappers blindfolded him and bundled him into a vehicle. They drove for a long distance and then took him to a small room where they locked him up. He also mentioned that the abductors denied (him) food,” Omtatah said.
“The fight against abductions has to continue until all the abductees are released and justice is served,” he added.
The government, which denies involvement, has been at the receiving end of public outrage following the disappearance of several youth at the onset of the Christmas holiday.
The government-funded Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR) said a total of 82 people had gone missing since June, 2024, at the height of the Gen z-led anti-government street protests.
The rights commission claimed 29 of them had by late December not been accounted for.
But almost in a coordinated fashion, Bull’s emergence made it five the number of youth who claimed they had been released by their alleged abductors Monday morning.
"They dropped me in Luanda Vihiga at 3-4 am today. I did not know where to go or where to book a room," Bull said on his X account.
The others are Billy Mwangi, Peter Muteti, Bernard Kavuli and Rony Kiplangat, all who families said had been rejoined with them.
Police said
Kavuli presented himself to Moi’s Bridge police station in Trans Nzoia, miles
away from Ngong in Kajiado county where he went missing.
He later travelled back to Nairobi on the same day.
Rony, a brother to Bull, was found in Machakos county while Muteti was found in Nairobi CBD after he was allegedly picked up bu unknown people in Uthiru on December 21.
Mwangi, a college student, was found in Embu.
