Cord principal Raila Odinga has demanded the release of six detained MPs within the next 24 hours, failure to which there will be “consequences”
Mr Odinga said Cord will issue a comprehensive statement in an hour’s time and specify the “consequences”
On Thursday Mr Odinga and co-principals Moses Wetang’ula and Kalonzo Musyoka visited Pangani Police Station where six politicians are being held.
The Cord leaders who waited for hours at the station, were barred from seeing the MPs.
Other leaders at the police station were Siaya Senator James Orengo, Homa Bay Women Representative Gladys Wanga and Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero.
Several relatives of the politicians had been camping at the police station demanding to be allowed to see MPs, whom a court ordered they be detained for five days.
The MPs include Moses Kuria, Ferdinand Waititu, and Kimani Ngunjiri from the Jubilee coalition. The others, from Cord, are Junet Mohammed, Timothy Bosire and Johnstone Muthama.
PREVENTED FROM SEEING
Senator Muthama sister, Esther Muthama, said they had been prevented from visiting him or offering food.
“We cannot give him warm clothing as we have been barred from doing so,” she said outside the police station.
One of Mr Muthama’s lawyers, Mr Simon Ole Kamwaro, said that the senator was not feeling well and complained bitterly that he had been denied access to his client.
“It is the right of every Kenyan to have access to his lawyer but I have been kept for more than an hour waiting. The police are just engaged in a public relations gimmick,” he said.
Ms Wanga, the Homa Bay Women Representative, complained that the Cord leaders had been denied access to the suspects.
“They have been kept waiting in another room yet they have a right to visit the suspects”, she said.
Ms Wanga also said that one of the female MPs locked up at Muthaiga Police Station was not feeling well, adding that Cord leaders would head there afterwards.
At Pangani, an aide of the Machakos senator said the six suspects, three from Cord and a similar number from Jubilee, were locked up in one cell together with other suspects.
A pro-Cord crowd chanted outside the station with placards, demanding the release of the Cord MPs while condemning the detained Jubilee legislators for allegedly calling for the “assassination” of Mr Odinga.
Cord supporters outside Pangani Police Station.
Cord co-principal Kalonzo Musyoka confers with Mrs Jemima Muthama, wife of Machakos Senator Johnson Muthama, who is being detained at Pangani Police Station.
Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero arrives at Pangani Police Station to visit the suspects.
