Buck stops with you, Mr President

President Mwai Kibaki’s statement last night dissociating his family from the impudent Armenian brothers came rather too late. Still, it did not answer the questions frightened Kenyans have always asked. Just who are these gold-bedecked thugs who have been terrorizing Kenyans for the last two months? When the issue of the alleged mercenaries first came to the limelight in March, the president never uttered a word. Instead, his minister for immigration and registration of persons Gideon Konchellah insisted that the foreigners, whose nationalities he wasn’t even sure about, were investors. That was also the assertion from Internal security minister John Michuki, he of the ‘rattle snake’ infamy.

Much as the government may continue denying its association with these goons, it still owes Kenyans and the international community an explanation. The recent incident at the country’s international airport in which the two brothers – Artur margaryan and Artur Sargasyan drew guns and assaulted a customs official who wanted their bags opened for inspection- will always stick out like a sore thumb. Yet our government, that claims to be committed to fighting terrorism, allowed foreigners to brandish guns at the airport, triggering a terror alert in the process. It does not help matters that these very foreigners were issued with all area access airport passes, a privilege that even senior government officials do not enjoy. What’s more, they even had Kenyan passports and other identification documents.

Still, the question that will linger in the minds of Kenyans is why these goons were allowed safe passage to Dubai, where they still continue to ridicule the same government that offered them protection. Perhaps in an attempt to cover up its link with the alleged mercenaries, the government hastily ‘deported’ them to Dubai even before they could face the full force of the law. That the two were allowed to use vehicles with government registration and diplomatic number plates points to a high level protection they were enjoying from the government. Otherwise how else would one explain the fact that they were also found in possession of guns only reserved for use by the president’s security detail?

Mr president, what Kenyans want to know is not whether these people were associated with your family members. Rather, they would like to know what the two have been doing in the country and why they were allowed to terrorise Kenyans and insult the government at every opportunity.