Attempt on Orengo life as talks future shaken

Ugenya legislator and reform advocate James Aggrey Orengo escaped an assassin's bullet by a whisker Saturday morning, we can now report. The attack took place at 2AM at his residence. The attackers were repulsed after they inflicted some damage to the house. He was however not hurt in the creepy attack by what is now evidently agents of PNU killer gang. This attempt comes immediately after the remains of the Ainamoi ODM legislator were interred at his Chepkoiyo home in Kericho district.

Another ODM MP, Melittus Mugabe Were was assassinated by Mungiki recently outside his Nairobi residence. The attacks, say analysts close to the ODM command, are meant to cow the highly effective ODM quartet of VP Musalia Mudavadi, William Ruto and Dr Sally Kosgei at the Annan mediation table at which PNU has had to make embarrassing concessions to accommodate international pressure not to allow the Annan talks collapse. Orengo is a very important personality in the legal and political thinking of ODM. He is reputed to be fearless and witty and this attempt on his life will no doubt embolden him at the mediation talks. He fought many battles in the struggle for the re-introduction of multiparty politics in Kenya.

Some rogue PNU politicians have been reported to fund mungiki. The ragtag army with repugnant cultural prescriptions for the Kikuyu which include the cut for the girls and a zero tolerance for trousers by women, mungiki terrorists are reported to engage in queer oathings. They have claimed responsibility for the death of Embakasi MP Mugabe Were. We have reported that they were getting arms from the government, bought using taxpayers money from Chinese suppliers. We had earlier reported that some PNU-affiliated government officials were purchasing firearms from the failed Somalia. Some mungiki are already garbed in police uniforms and although the police are investigating the attempt on Orengo, it is a case of the police investigating themselves.

It was recently reported that some people posing as policemen went to the Nairobi home of the peoples' president Raila Odinga allegedly to serve petition court papers to him even though the law provides for publication for the notice in the media where the process servers cannot deliver the court papers. They were repulsed. Mr Orengo's campaign suffered a setback in December 2007 when his driver was murdered by goons associated with his PNU-funded opponent, Wanga. The case is yet to take off. The Kenya Police are not impartial in their investigations. In the height of the Orange-Banana showdown for the constitutional reforms, at attempt was made ODM Secretary General Anyang Peter Nyong'o.

The government has failed to offer protection to opposition MPs while thugs like Stanley Livondo have round-the-clock protection by the police and APs. The attempt on Orengo will surely feature at tomorrow's resumption of the Annan talks. The talks enter a critical stage when It is claimed that PNU will attempt to do anything to stymie or slow down the progress and success of the Annan talks. We condemn this use of terror gangs to intimidate ODM leaders and demand that they be given adequate security.