16 dead and hundreds injured in Kenya protests, Amnesty International says
Sixteen people have been killed and about 400 injured after thousands of people took to the streets in Kenya on Wednesday to protest against the government, Amnesty International Kenya has said.
The death toll was confirmed to CNN Thursday by Irungu Houghton, who heads the human rights organization.
Protesters took to the streets this week to mark one year since the anti-tax demonstrations last June, which left dozens dead and sparked nationwide outrage.
The demonstrations in 2024 forced the withdrawal of a controversial finance bill that raised taxes. However, many of Kenya's youth are still enraged over several cases of alleged police brutality, including the death of a teacher in police custody and the shooting of an unarmed street vendor.
On Wednesday, thousands of people demonstrated in the capital of Nairobi, the coastal city of Mombasa and other towns to mark the protest anniversary.
In Nairobi, roads leading to the Kenyan Parliament building and the president's office were barricaded ahead of the demonstrations.
CNN witnessed police shooting live rounds in Nairobi to disperse peaceful protesters Wednesday as government regulator, the Communications Authority of Kenya ordered all television and radio stations in the country to stop broadcasting live coverage of the youth-led march.
Several of the demonstrators showed spent cartridges. Demonstrators were also repelled with tear gas and water cannon trucks in the capital – reminiscent of last year's dramatic scenes.
The government agency falsely claimed live coverage of the demonstrations violated Kenyan laws while threatening regulatory action for non-compliance with the directive.
Some Kenyan broadcast channels were taken off the air after resisting the directive but resumed coverage after a Nairobi court suspended the ban.
Kenyan civil society groups denounced the ban as unconstitutional, saying in a joint statement with Amnesty Kenya that live coverage of protests was crucial to deterring 'excessive force and human rights violations by ensuring that actions are witnessed and recorded, thus fostering accountability.'
The Kenya Editors' Guild described the ban as 'draconian' and an assault on democracy.
Some 400 people were injured during demonstrations on Wednesday, according to another joint statement signed by Amnesty Kenya and groups including the Law Society of Kenya, Police Reforms Working Group and the Kenya Medical Association.
The statement said 83 of those hurt had serious injuries and at least eight protesters were treated for gunshot wounds.
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In hundreds of hours of PBS programs, he proved at home with subjects ranging from government corruption to modern dance, from drug addiction to media consolidation, from religion to environmental abuse. In 1988, Moyers produced 'The Secret Government' about the Iran-Contra scandal during the Reagan administration and simultaneously published a book under the same name. Around that time, he galvanized viewers with 'Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth,' a series of six one-hour interviews with the prominent religious scholar. The accompanying book became a best-seller. Advertisement His televised chats with poet Robert Bly almost single-handedly launched the 1990s Men's Movement, and his 1993 series 'Healing and the Mind' had a profound impact on the medical community and on medical education. In a medium that supposedly abhors 'talking heads' — shots of subject and interviewer talking — Moyers came to specialize in just that. He once explained why: 'The question is, are the talking heads thinking minds and thinking people? Are they interesting to watch? I think the most fascinating production value is the human face.' (Softly) speaking truth to power Demonstrating what someone called 'a soft, probing style' in the native Texas accent he never lost, Moyers was a humanist who investigated the world with a calm, reasoned perspective, whatever the subject. From some quarters, he was blasted as a liberal thanks to his links with Johnson and public television, as well as his no-holds-barred approach to investigative journalism. It was a label he didn't necessarily deny. Advertisement 'I'm an old-fashion liberal when it comes to being open and being interested in other people's ideas,' he said during a 2004 radio interview. But Moyers preferred to term himself a 'citizen journalist' operating independently, outside the establishment. 3 Bill Moyers speaks during the wake for R. Sargent Shriver in Washington on Jan. 21, 2011. AP Public television (and his self-financed production company) gave him free rein to throw 'the conversation of democracy open to all comers,' he said in a 2007 interview with The Associated Press. 'I think my peers in commercial television are talented and devoted journalists,' he said another time, 'but they've chosen to work in a corporate mainstream that trims their talent to fit the corporate nature of American life. And you do not get rewarded for telling the hard truths about America in a profit-seeking environment.' Advertisement Over the years, Moyers was showered with honors, including more than 30 Emmys, 11 George Foster Peabody awards, three George Polks and, twice, the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Gold Baton Award for career excellence in broadcast journalism. In 1995, he was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame. From sports to sports writing Born in Hugo, Oklahoma, on June 5, 1934, Billy Don Moyers was the son of a dirt farmer-truck driver who soon moved his family to Marshall, Texas. High school led him into journalism. 'I wanted to play football, but I was too small. But I found that by writing sports in the school newspaper, the players were always waiting around at the newsstand to see what I wrote,' he recalled. He worked for the Marshall News Messenger at age 16. Deciding that Bill Moyers was a more appropriate byline for a sportswriter, he dropped the 'y' from his name. 3 Journalist Bill Moyers delivers the keynote speech at the People for the American Way Foundation's Spirit of Liberty dinner in Beverly Hills September 21, 2004. REUTERS He graduated from the University of Texas and earned a master's in divinity from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He was ordained and preached part time at two churches but later decided his call to the ministry 'was a wrong number.' His relationship with Johnson began when he was in college; he wrote the then-senator offering to work in his 1954 re-election campaign. Johnson was impressed and hired him for a summer job. He was back in Johnson's employ as a personal assistant in the early 1960s and for two years, he worked at the Peace Corps, eventually becoming deputy director. On the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Moyers was in Austin helping with the presidential trip. He flew back to Washington on Air Force One with newly sworn-in President Johnson, for whom he held various jobs over the ensuing years, including press secretary. Advertisement Moyers' stint as presidential press secretary was marked by efforts to mend the deteriorating relationship between Johnson and the media. But the Vietnam war took its toll and Moyers resigned in December 1966. Of his departure from the White House, he wrote later, 'We had become a war government, not a reform government, and there was no creative role left for me under those circumstances.' He conceded that he may have been 'too zealous in my defense of our policies' and said he regretted criticizing journalists such as Pulitzer Prize-winner Peter Arnett, then a special correspondent with the AP, and CBS's Morley Safer for their war coverage. A long run on television In 1967, Moyers became publisher of Long Island-based Newsday and concentrated on adding news analyses, investigative pieces and lively features. Within three years, the suburban daily had won two Pulitzers. He left the paper in 1970 after the ownership changed. That summer, he traveled 13,000 miles around the country and wrote a best-selling account of his odyssey: 'Listening to America: a Traveler Rediscovers His Country.' Advertisement His next venture was in public television and he won critical acclaim for 'Bill Moyers Journal,' a series in which interviews ranged from Gunnar Myrdal, the Swedish economist, to poet Maya Angelou. He was chief correspondent of 'CBS Reports' from 1976 to 1978, went back to PBS for three years, and then was senior news analyst for CBS from 1981 to 1986. When CBS cut back on documentaries, he returned to PBS for much less money. 'If you have a skill that you can fold with your tent and go wherever you feel you have to go, you can follow your heart's desire,' he once said. Then in 1986, he and his wife, Judith Davidson Moyers, became their own bosses by forming Public Affairs Television, an independent shop that has not only produced programs such as the 10-hour 'In Search of the Constitution,' but also paid for them through its own fundraising efforts. Advertisement His projects in the 21st century included 'Now,' a weekly PBS public affairs program; a new edition of 'Bill Moyers Journal' and a podcast covering racism, voting rights and the rise of Donald Trump, among other subjects. Moyers married Judith Davidson, a college classmate, in 1954, and they raised three children, among them the author Suzanne Moyers and author-TV producer William Cope Moyers. Judith eventually became her husband's partner, creative collaborator and president of their production company.
