Alternative conflict resolution ‘could heal troubled Kapedo’

Noah Cheploen @cheploennoah

A few days ago, Rift Valley Regional Commissioner George Natembeya made a troubling admission regarding the century-old conflict in Kapedo, after three more people, including a police officer, were killed. 

Known for his bold approach to matters security and governance, Natembeya told journalists the Kapedo conflict cannot be solved by deploying police officers but through other conflict resolution mechanisms. 

In his own words, the conflict between Pokot and Turkana communities in the area has become so bad that they cannot sit in the same room and the police are finding themselves in the middle of the conflict.  

“We no longer have serious cases of cattle rustling. But the trend which is developing now is that citizens from different communities are attacking each other for no reason but just because they belong to different tribes,”said Natembeya. 

Warring communities

“We have had an opportunity to go out there and meet some of these warring communities and the report we are getting from the ground is not very good,” he said.

Currently, the relationship between Pokot and Turkana is very bad and as a matter of fact the people cannot sit down and talk,” he said, adding: “When Pokot move to a place, the Turkana will move away… ideally in places where there is pasture and water they would interact but that is not happening.” 

Natembeya indicated that the bad blood between the two communities in the area is no longer about water and pasture or stock theft but a long running boundary dispute particularly the area surrounding Kapedo.

Kapedo a small trading centre lies at the border of Turkana East and Tiaty sub counties in Turkana and Baringo counties respectively. The centre is dominated by Turkana but Pokot live in the ‘rural’ areas. 

The area has become a thorn in the flesh of both the government and locals because hardly a month passes without a case of bloodletting is reported. In 2002, 35 people were killed in the volatile border by suspected Pokot bandits. 

For instance, the suspicion and mistrust has seen  Silale Location been given two chiefs: one from Turkana East sub-county and the other from Tiaty sub-county, representing both communities.

And, in 2003, another 100 people of Turkana decent were brutally murdered by suspected Pokot bandits after a deadly clash near Akoret before another 30 from the same community were butchered the following year. 

But the deadliest attack happened in 2014 when attackers ambushed a police truck before spraying it with bullets killing 21 police officers on the spot. This was the second biggest police causality in the country ever. 

More than 42 officers were killed in the Suguta valley in Baragoi, Samburu county in one of the deadliest attacks ever seen in the country’s history.

It is not possible to give an accurate number of fatalities in this troubled region over the years but it is in hundreds. 

Senate security committee, then headed by Garissa Senator Yusuf Haji, visited the area in 2015 on a fact-finding mission but not much has been heard after the visit. 

At the heart of the boundary dispute is the burning desire but members of the two communities to control geo-resources that the area is well endowed with, for example, the geothermal power that Geothermal Development Company is currently developing. 

Although it is generally a dry area, the 150-metre waterfall gushing hot water from Silale Hills could be a major tourist attraction were it not for incessant ethnic animosity and the trail of deaths. 

Boundary dispute

“These are  boundary generated disputes but nobody can say that they don’t know where the boundary is because we have posted county commissioners and other government officers there… the governors are also there,” said Natembeya.

“The citizens pretend  they don’t know where the boundaries are… Along that border we have eleven units of GSU and RDU. We have over 1,500 officers there and there also KDF,” he added.

“We will ensure that they don’t fight but the problem of ethnic hatred will not have been solved,” said Natembeya during a meeting with National Cohesion and Integration Commission.