The cameras were switched off. The hard drives were wiped. The official story – that Albert Omondi Ojwang had somehow killed himself by banging his head against a cell wall – fell apart the moment  a government pathologist revealed the truth: serious head trauma, neck compression and multiple soft tissue injuries consistent with assault.

Within 70 minutes of being booked into Nairobi Central Police Station, the 31-year-old teacher and blogger was dead. His crime was criticising a senior police official on social media. His punishment was a 350-kilometre journey to the capital, isolation from family and legal support and death at the hands of those whose job was to protect him.

Kenya’s police are used to getting away with murder. They unleashed lethal violence against mass protests that began in June 2024. But Ojwang was a well-known figure whose social media presence made his killing impossible to ignore. His death offered clinching confirmation of what many Kenyans already knew: their police force has long been a tool of state terror.

The hashtag #JusticeForAlbertOjwang began trending as soon as Ojwang’s father told his story on TV. Protesters declared that this should be the last police killing and demanded accountability for a pattern of brutality that has claimed over 100 lives since June 2024.

From economic grievances to police accountability

Kenya’s current protest cycle started when the government introduced the 2024 Finance Bill that proposed steep tax increases on essential goods to meet International Monetary Fund targets. The protest movement that sprung up in response was led by young people using social media to educate, organise and fundraise, crucially transcending traditional ethnic divisions.

The initial protests peaked on 25 June 2024, when police deployed snipers who fired live ammunition into peaceful crowds, killing over 60 people. President William Ruto subsequently withdrew the Finance Bill and dismissed his cabinet – although most who lost their posts were soon back in the cabinet. Protesters rejected these concessions as insufficient and protests continued, demanding justice for victims of police abuses.

Between the start of the protests and Ojwang’s death, at least 82 people had been abducted by armed plainclothes personnel, with 26 still missing. Ojwang’s killing further crystallised public anger about police corruption and impunity.

Anatomy of police violence

Human Rights Watch research shows that officers involved in abductions and killings come from multiple agencies, including the Directorate of Criminal Investigations, military intelligence and the National Intelligence Service. The coordination required for their repressive operations indicates a problem of institutional culture rather than rogue behaviour.

The pattern is systemic and follows a familiar script. Ojwang’s treatment following his arrest on charges of ‘false publication’ for exposing alleged corruption exemplified how the system works: arbitrary arrest, isolation from legal support, violence in custody, cover-up of evidence and initial denial followed by scapegoating of lower-ranking officers.

When the police chief was publicly forced to retract the police’s initial false claims and apologise for ‘misinformation’, it confirmed what many Kenyans already believed: that police routinely lie about their conduct. The coordinated cover-up – from deleted footage to fabricated stories – revealed an institution designed to protect perpetrators rather than pursue justice.

Escalating repression and performative responses

Six police officers were arrested following Ojwang’s death, including the constable who allegedly killed him, but the high-ranking official whose complaint triggered the arrest initially refused to resign. Only after sustained public pressure did he step aside pending investigation. This selective accountability reinforced protesters’ demands for systemic rather than cosmetic change.

But the scale of the problem could be seen in the fact that protests following Ojwang’s death were also met with characteristic police violence. During protests in June, police shot an unarmed bystander, street vendor Boniface Kariuki, at close range in the head. The act of violence, captured on camera, sparked additional outrage.

Despite a 2024 court order requiring officers to be in uniform with visible identification during protests, they’ve continued to operate with covered faces and obscured vehicle registration numbers. The deployment of government-sponsored gangs of bikers armed with whips and clubs has become increasingly common, with police standing by as they attack protesters.

The culmination came on 7 July, Saba Saba Day, which commemorates protests for multiparty democracy in 1990. Police fired live rounds and water cannon at protesters, killing at least 31. The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights reported further abductions and arrests. One of the protesters arrested that day, Julia Njoki, died in police custody in circumstances similar to Ojwang’s.

A movement that refuses to die

The cycle of protest, police violence, government concession and renewed unrest illustrates a fundamental mismatch between the reforms authorities are willing to offer and the changes protesters demand. While the government has responded with measures designed to defuse immediate anger – such as withdrawing the 2024 Finance Bill, arresting individual officers and announcing new training programmes – protesters have continued to demand accountability for systemic institutional failures.

Cosmetic reforms will never be enough in the face of an institutional culture rooted in confident expectation of impunity. Training programmes and CCTV cameras won’t change a police culture that systematically covers up brutality, just as arrests of individual officers can’t fix command structures that enable abuse. The demands of protesters to prosecute those responsible, end disappearances and ensure transparent oversight represents a widespread recognition that institutional problems require institutional solutions.

The persistence of protests despite government concessions shows that Kenya’s Generation Z rejects the traditional pattern where authorities offer symbolic changes in exchange for a pause in protests. Whether Kenya’s institutions can adapt to meet protesters’ demands or they continue to offer inadequate responses to fundamental challenges will determine whether the current crisis deepens or finally begins to resolve. At stake are the democratic ideals Kenya’s young people are striving to defend.

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