Cord demands probe into businessman Jacob Juma's mystery murder

Businessman Jacob Juma at a past interview. He was shot dead by unknown gunmen on Lenana Road on May 5, 2016. FILE PHOTO |  NATION MEDIA GROUP

By EDWIN MUTAI, emutai@ke.nationmedia.com

In Summary

• Cord co-principal Moses Wetangula says Cord believes that a hit squad is responsible for the killing of Mr Juma.

Five Cord MPs have demanded the formation of a commission of inquiry to investigate the assassination of controversial businessman Jacob Juma.

Opposition Cord co-principal Moses Wetangula said the killing of Mr Juma was “politically motivated” to silence his incessant critique on corruption and malpractices in the ruling Jubilee administration.

Mr Wetangula said Cord believes that a hit squad is responsible for the killing of Mr Juma.

“We want a special inquiry into the killing. We know that Mr Juma had tweeted expressing fears that his life was in danger. We want an open-minded investigation so that we know who killed Mr Juma. This is not an ordinary killing because we hear that his body was pumped with more than ten bullets,” Mr Wetangula said.

Unknown people riding on motorcycles ambushed Mr Juma Thursday night along Lenana School in Nairobi as he drove home.

“For the last three years Juma has been very active in social media engaging so many people in government. Thugs hardly can shoot you more than ten times. No robber will kill you and walk away because they kill to rob you,” Mr Wetangula said.

“We want a commission of inquiry to know what happened to Mr Juma who was a steadfast person in exposing issues of corruption, Eurobond and land grabbing. He had very serious information,” Dr Boni Khalwale, the Kakamega Senator said.

He said Mr Juma had tweeted severally on the scandals involving Sh250 billion Eurobond, the Sh791 million National Youth Service, the Lang'ata road land grabbing and malpractices in government.

Mr Khalwale tabled samples of Mr Juma’s tweets some of which expressing fears to his life and demanded that the commission of inquiry and the police should record statements from those mentioned.

MPs Chris Wamalwa (Kiminini), Jared Opiyo (Awendo) and Dr Eseli Simiyu (Tongaren) condemned the killings and sent messages of condolences to Mr Juma’s family his friend and the people of Bungoma where he hails from.