Kenyan MP Gunned Down In Downtown Nairobi. Assassination Of Politicians Is Not New In Kenya & EAC

A Kenyan member of parliament (MP) has been gunned down in downtown Nairobi, reported some East African media on May 1, 2025.

According to the reports, the MP, namely Charles Ong'ondo Were, was gunned down by two gunmen on a motorcycle, on the evening of April 30, 2025. The assailants are said to have opened fire on his automobile at close range, as it was approaching a busy roundabout along Nairobi's popular Ngong Road. The assailants who seem to have been trailing the MP's automobile hitherto unleashing the fatal attack, then fled the scene and are still at large.

Kenyan MP gunned down in downtown Nairobi. Assassination of politicians is not new in Kenya & EAC

The police there have reportedly described the killing as targeted and predetermined hence a suspected assassination. Who the assailants are, and the motives of the attack, is currently unknown.

Charles Ong'ondo Were was an MP for a constituency called Kasipul in western Kenya, under the ticket of the main opposition party Orange Democratic Movement (ODM).

Assassination of politicians, and MPs in particular, is not new in Kenya, according to some Kenyan media sources. Such assassinations were prevalent during the one-party system era. The political epoch that spanned from 1963 to 1990, witnessed assassination of numerous politicians including the following 4 prominent politicians.

• Gama Pinto (1965)

• Tom Mboya (1969)

• J M Kariuki (1975)

• Robert Ouko (1990)

The assassination of politicians continued unabated after the country adopted multipartyism in 1991, including assassination of the following MPs.

• Tony Ndilinge (2001)

• Mugabe Were (2008)

• David Kimutai Too (2008)

• George Muchai (2015)

• Charles Ong'ondo Were (2025, suspected assassination)

Elsewhere in other member states of the East African Community (EAC), assassination of politicians was rather rare during their one-party system eras, except Uganda that saw massive such assassinations under the notorious dictator Iddi Amin. However, after the countries adopted multipartyism on paper in the 1990s, that in practice has, so far, been largely pseudo multipartyism or simply pseudo democracy, things changed dramatically. Reportedly, the new political era saw assassination and abduction of opposition politicians becoming predominant in Tanzania, and to certain extent in Rwanda; while politically motivated incarceration, repression, and harassment of opposition politicians are becoming common place in Uganda.

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