NAKURU, Kenya Mar 7 – Sergeant Kipyegon Kenei, the Administration Policeman killed in Sh39 billion arms supply scandal was set to be buried Saturday.
Kenei, who worked at the Deputy President William Ruto’ s Harambee Annex office, will be buried at his home in Chemasis village of Solai in Rongai, Nakuru County.
His body was transferred Nakuru Friday, and preserved at the Umash Funeral Home ahead of the burial.
The Director of Criminal Investigations George Kinoti says Kenei was murdered, and his body taken to his house in Imara Daima, where it was found, with a pistol next to it, in an apparent stage-managed suicide scene.
“We have evidence to show that he did not commit suicide,” Kinoti told a news conference on Thursday, “this is case of murder. They killed him and stage-managed the scene.” His body had a bullet wound on the chin.
While no names of suspects have been made public, Kinoti said “we have no doubt that it is linked to the arms scandal.”
Kenei is the one who ushered in former Sports Cabinet Secretary Rashid Echesa to Ruto’s office, where the former CS had taken to arms foreign arms dealers to cut a deal in which he received Sh11.5 million in commitment fees.
In CCTV footage released by the DCI, Kenei is seen welcoming Echesa, the trio arms dealers and a fake military general–all in the deal.
Kinoti said detectives have concluded that Kenei must have been killed for what he knew about the deal, “because the stakes appear to have been so high if he exposed them.”
Echesa and two others are already facing charges of obtaining money in false pretense and are put on bond.
Kenei was killed as he prepared to record a statement at the DCI Headquarters where he had been summoned.
While the DCI accuses the DP’s office of failing to report his disappearance, a Chief of Staff at Annex Ken Osinde produced a letter showing that they had filed the report.
“The family is happy with the investigations into the murder and the progress so far especially the plan to open his cellphone and track the conversations,” his father John Chesang said told journalists in Nakuru.
He assured that his son’s burial will be peaceful, allaying fears that there might be chaos.
