Kenya - Kaiser's death: Is there a cover-up?

["Nadia & Giovanni" <nadia.joe@tiscalinet.it>]

Kenya
Kaiser's death: Is there a cover-up?

Human Rights

by Special Correspondent
The Kenyan media's coverage of the last days and hours of Mill Hill
Missionary Fr. John Kaiser's life paint the picture of a very erratic and
irrational priest. Investigators may use this "suicide" theory to cover up
who really was behind the murder.


One-and-a-half months have passed since the brutal slaying of Mill Hill
Missionary Fr. John Kaiser. During this time, there have been more questions
than answers, more theories than hard-core facts. Everyone from journalists
and commentators to the person in the pew has constructed various scenarios
of why, how, and by whom Fr. Kaiser was killed.

The final report of the United States' Federal Bureau of Investigations
(FBI) and the Kenya government's Criminal Investigation Department (CID) is
expected to put to rest, or temper somewhat, this intense speculation.
However, the way that the detectives are gathering their facts and how those
facts are leaked to the media - particularly in the exclusive stories of
Kenya's national newspaper The Daily Nation - seem to suggest that the
finger of blame could point wholly or partially at Fr. Kaiser himself. And
that conclusion will serve to cover up what really happened.

One source close to the investigation feels that FBI and CID investigators
may be focussing in on the suicide theory. In a lengthy interview with the
source, who knew Fr. Kaiser, investigators repeatedly asked questions about
Fr. Kaiser's mental state prior to his death, despite the fact that the
source was able to provide a wide range of information. The source pointed
out many inconsistencies in the way things appeared to look: Fr. Kaiser, for
instance, would never have stripped his bed and was "incapable" of folding
bedsheets, blankets, or anything else.

The source maintains that the FBI is not following up on certain tips - for
instance, a witness testified that a lorry tried to run Fr. Kaiser's pick-up
off the road as he was driving - and may in fact be involved in a cover-up
of Fr. Kaiser's death. That feeling is shared by Tony Gachoka, publisher and
CEO of a local newspaper called The Post. In an open letter to the FBI in
the September 15 edition of Finance magazine, Gachoka said the FBI and
Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) were involved in a cover-up in the 1990
murder of Foreign Minister Robert Ouko, who many believe was assassinated by
the Kenyan government. He points to a chapter in a book written by former
United States Ambassador to Kenya Smith Hempstone to support his claim.

"It is instructive that you are aware that many Kenyans believe that the
Kenyan government, with your assistance, will attempt to cover-up these
cowardly act [sic] that ended Fr. Kaiser's life," wrote Gachoka. "In which
case, like other political murders, Kenyans should reject any cover-up and
insist on the criminals and the "godfathers" - behind them - being charged
in court."

Interestingly, the "suicide" theory and the excessive interest in Fr.
Kaiser's mental state just before his death have been constant themes in the
reportage of the investigation. The earliest reports of the tragedy
suggested that Fr. Kaiser blew his head off with his own gun, since the gun
was found lying with his body. That theory was weakened somewhat when Nakuru
police boss Andrew Kimetto had said that before he was murdered, Fr. Kaiser
was forced to kneel down and say his prayers - a statement that a local
daily The People later called a "characteristic blunder" on the police's
part, for how would they know such details of how Fr. Kaiser died unless
they were present on the scene or had some insider information?

The suicide theory was further pushed aside following statements by Papal
Nuncio Bishop Giovanni Tonucci, Bishop John Njue, and others calling
Kaiser's death a "religious assassination" and holding senior government
officials responsible for the murder. Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi and
Cabinet Minister Marsden Madoka, among others, reacted angrily to these
statements in the press.

Yet throughout the media coverage, Fr. Kaiser's behavior in the last days
and hours before he died has been a primary focus. We have heard in detail
how the priest expressed fears for his life, his nervous agitation, his
pacing up and down in his room at Ngong Bishops' House, and his sudden
disappearance from there, neatly-folded bedsheets and blankets in tow.

One month after his death, we were shocked to read about Fr. Kaiser's
"bizarre last visit" to the house of James Ngugi - a complete stranger - in
Kiambu. Fr. Kaiser had allegedly drove into Ngugi's compound, alighted from
his pick-up holding a shotgun, uttered a few words, hopped back into his
vehicle, damaged a gutter of Ngugi's house as he reversed the vehicle, then
slammed into a tree as he sped away.

Ngugi - whose compound was very isolated - did not report the matter to the
police and does not know how investigators found out about the incident. We
also read that Kaiser - wrapped up in a sheet and blanket - pulled into a
gas station hours before he died and, upon alighting, replaced his sheet and
blanket with a jacket. Gas station attendant Njumbe Munene said Fr. Kaiser
appeared composed and calm.

Whether Ngugi and Munene's stories are genuine or whether the two were paid
off to say what they said is unknown at this point. The significant thing is
that these were the details - out of the many leads, clues, and facts
gathered by detectives - that were given big play in the press, stories that
somehow paint the picture of a very erratic and irrational Kaiser. The
October 4 issue of The People went as far as to report that police insiders
were using the media "to create confusion through select updates on the
Kaiser probe."

Even as late as mid-September - after interviewing scores of witnesses,
reviewing forensic evidence, etc. - investigators still had not ruled out
the possibility of suicide. On September 18, The Daily Nation reported that
FBI and CID officials classified Fr. Kaiser's case as a "violent death,"
which means "it might have been a murder or a suicide."

Why the FBI and CID would cover up Fr. Kaiser's real killers is the source
of much speculation. A story in the September 22-28 issue of The Post
contains an interesting article about the relationship between Kenya and the
United States - brokered by Head of Public Service Richard Leakey and World
Bank President James Wolfensohn - which, according to the report, is
improving because the U.S. wants to expand its interests in East Africa
beyond Uganda.

Fr. Kaiser, meanwhile, was to be a witness in an upcoming court case in
England charging Moi and members of his government with genocide for their
role in ethnic clashes during the 1990s, claims Gachoka. And the September
15 Finance reports that Fr. Kaiser was also on his way to Arusha, Tanzania,
to hand to a aide of U.S. President Bill Clinton sensitive documents about
Ouko's murder and details of the causes and perpetrators of ethnic clashes
in Kenya last decade. Other reports indicated that Fr. Kaiser had more
information of rapes committed by senior government officials such as MP
Julius ole Sunkuli. If this is true, and if the U.S. is indeed consolidating
its interests in Kenya, that might account for the apparent "suicide"
campaign to explain Fr. Kaiser's death.

And exactly who ordered the execution - and pulled the trigger - is even
bigger speculation. The October 4 edition of the daily The People reports
that the government hired seven death row convicts to carry out the crime in
exchange for freedom that would be granted through a prison escape.
Unfortunately, as media headlines screamed on September 5, six of these were
"gunned down" - later, they were discovered to have their heads smashed in
and their eyes gouged out - as they tried to escape. The September 4-17
issue of Newsline opines that it is too obvious to blame Fr. Kaiser's death
on President Moi, Sunkuli or Cabinet Ministers Nicholas Biwott and William
ole Ntimama (who Fr. Kaiser had testified sent Kenyan youth to Israel for
commando training during the ethnic clashes), especially because Fr.
Kaiser's death conveniently occurred just before Clinton's trip to Tanzania.
Newsline attributes the killing to a "third force working deep within the
political establishment to rock the boat right from within."

Whatever the explanations of who murdered Fr. Kaiser, how, and why, one fact
must remain high in peoples' minds: throughout his mission, Fr. Kaiser had
always risked his comfort, security, and, indeed life, to speak the truth.
His testimony to the Akiwumi Commission on Tribal Clashes on how the
government caused the clashes and evicted Kiisi and Kuria people from Trans
Mara District, his rape evidence against Sunkuli, and his other activities
all point to a person who loved the truth and was willing to risk all to be
a voice for the voiceless. We must act on the information Fr. Kaiser has
made public, and thus fulfil the statement Bishop Tonucci made at Fr.
Kaiser's funeral: "If somebody thought that through his physical
elimination, the embarrassing questions raised by his presence could be
silenced once and for all, his calculation was completely wrong."





__________________________________________________
"Call to me
    and I will answer you and will tell you great and hidden things
       which you
           have not known." - Jeremiah 33:3