On the morning of Sunday, July 12, 2026, residents of Milimani, Kisumu, expected little more than another ordinary day of worship. Congregants streamed into church, while several political leaders arrived to attend the service. Few could have imagined that, before the morning was over, the area would become the scene of political violence.
The incident unfolded against a backdrop of rising political tension. The Linda
Mwananchi movement had become an increasingly vocal critic of the government, and the church service drew several prominent opposition figures, among them Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna, whose appearance attracted particular attention as one of his first major public engagements after his removal as ODM Secretary-General was approved.
A group of armed youths, carrying crude weapons including machetes, bows, and
arrows, converged on the church during the service. They were met by another group
that had gathered at the venue, triggering violent clashes outside the compound. Police
responded with tear gas, sealed off the area, and evacuated worshippers and political leaders. The same day, a church gathering linked to Linda Mwananchi in Nyahururu was similarly disrupted.
Barely a week later, the July 16 by-election in Ol-Kalou was itself marred by violence.
What should have been a routine democratic exercise instead became a scene of intimidation.
Journalists covering the polls were assaulted and robbed of their
equipment by armed, masked individuals. Footage from the polling areas showed
armed men and reports of gunfire, raising fresh concerns about the conduct of election security.
Viewed in isolation, each incident can be dismissed as an unfortunate disturbance.
Viewed together, however, they form a pattern that should concern every Kenyan.
History reminds us that moments of national tragedy seldom begin with a single
catastrophic event. More often, they begin with a series of incidents that society
dismisses as isolated, unfortunate, or temporary.
Kenya has walked that road before.
In the months leading up to the 2007 general election, political tensions steadily
intensified. Heated rhetoric, growing mistrust, and localized acts of violence were increasingly treated as part of the political landscape.
Few imagined these seemingly disconnected events would culminate in one of the darkest chapters in the country’s
history. Neighbours who had lived side by side for decades suddenly viewed one
another through the lens of political and ethnic identity. Families fled homes they had built over generations. Businesses were reduced to ashes. Communities that had once celebrated weddings together buried lovedones instead.
For many Kenyans, those memories remain painfully vivid. Yet for millions of young
voters preparing to vote in 2027, 2007 is something they know only through
photographs, documentaries, and stories told by their parents. Collective memory fades, and the consequences of forgetting can be severe.
The scenes in Kisumu and Ol-Kalou bring us back to three uncomfortable questions.
Have we begun to normalize political violence? Have we forgotten the lessons of
2007–08? Or have we simply grown so accustomed to peace that we mistake it for
permanence?
Perhaps the most dangerous thing about political violence is how easily it becomes
routine. Armed groups disrupt a gathering. Journalists are assaulted. A place of worship becomes a battleground. The headlines dominate for a day or two before the country moves on.
Then another incident follows, and another. Gradually, the shock wears off. What was
once unthinkable becomes familiar, then expected, then accepted as a grim feature of the electoral cycle rather than an unacceptable assault on our democracy.
For those who lived through 2007–08, it remains one of the darkest periods in Kenyan history. Remembered through faces rather than figures, through families displaced from homes they had known all their lives, through places of worship that, instead of offering sanctuary, became scenes of unimaginable tragedy.
One image has remained etched in Kenya’s collective memory: a mother who escaped
a burning church only to witness her young child thrown back into the flames by
attackers. This was relayed by BBC correspondent Karen Allen, during the aftermath of the Kiambaa Church Massacre.
Whether one remembers that specific tragedy or another from those dark weeks, the lesson is the same.
Political violence strips away our shared humanity before it claims lives.
Places of worship occupy a unique place in our national conscience. They are where we
seek refuge in moments of fear, celebrate life’s milestones, and mourn our dead.
When political violence creeps into these spaces, it should alarm us, because they symbolize the erosion of the boundaries that ordinarily restrain us. We should not measure peace by the absence of conflict alone, but by whether there remain places, institutions, and relationships that politics cannot invade.
Perhaps the greatest danger facing Kenya is that we remember 2007 as history rather
than as a warning. We cannot demand a peaceful election in 2027 if we tolerate the
normalization of violence in 2026.
The warning signs are flashing in Kisumu, in Nyahururu, and in Ol-Kalou. We can
choose to heed them. To demand accountability from our leaders and insist that our democratic institutions and sacred sanctuaries remain off-limits to political goonism.
Or we can look away, until we find ourselves asking, once again, how we let the darkness slip back in.