Veteran journalist Macharia Gaitho has been released moments after being abducted inside Karen police station.
According to her daughter Anita Gaitho, the journalist was roughed up by abductees who refused to identify themselves and took him away inside a Toyota Probox registration number KBC 725 J.
Gaitho was abducted after driving to Karen police station when he realised a car trailing him.
“I’m with my dad @MachariaGaitho. He’s just been brought to Karen police station by the car that abducted him. He’s safe although they roughed him up a bit. We’re making the abduction report right now,” Anita said in a statement on X on Wednesday, July 17, 2024.
“They claim to be DCl, they had guns and handcuffs and refused to identify themselves.”
In a statement, the National Police Service (NPS) claimed that Gaitho had been arrested following a case of mistaken identity, meant for the arrest of Francis Gaitho.
“The National Police Service would like to clarify to the public that this morning, we arrested journalist Macharia Gaitho in a case of mistaken identity, meant for the arrest of Francis Gaitho who is our subject of investigation,” NPS stated.
“We reiterate that as a Service, we do not target journalists in any way, and today’s incident is highly regrettable. The National Police Service remains committed to working with the media while discharging our mandate of promoting accountability and transparency.”
Police did not however reveal why Francis Gaitho is being sought.
DCI against Francis Gaitho
On July 15, 2024, the Directorate of Criminal Investigations accused Francis Gaitho of making misleading publications on X over the prime suspect in Kware killings.
“After our press briefing regarding the pursuit and subsequent arrest of the prime suspect in the Kware killings namely Collins Jumaisi Khalusha, we found it unfortunate that some X users discredited our investigation by alleging that we issued a misleading statement by getting the names of our 33-year-old suspect wrong,” DCI stated.
“Specifically, one Francis Gaitho (@FGaitho237) on his X account carelessly and with total disregard to the need to verify information, indicated that there existed no public record of our suspect, and went ahead to post the names, images and description of another innocent Kenyans by the name Jairus Onkundi.”
According to the DCI, Francis Gaitho’s posts implicated Jairus Onkudi, a 24-year-old graduate who later surrendered to the crimebusters.
“Hours later in the afternoon, our Complaints Directorate received a shaken young man in the names of Jairus Onkundi Morwabe aged 24 years and a graduate from Meru University of Science and Technology, who was surrendering himself to the authorities for clearance from any culpability in the ongoing investigation.”
“According to the complainant, he had received the circulating posts from worried family members and friends while at his workplace at Parklands in Nairobi, forcing him to rush to our offices fearing for his life in case he fell into the hands of agitated persons in the case of mistake of fact.”
DCI said Jairus had been given the necessary assistance from the side of the police.
