NAIROBI, Kenya -- The coronavirus hasn't devastated Kenya yet. Its ripple effects, however, have proved deadlier in the nation than the virus itself.
Police have killed at least 12 people while enforcing a dusk-to-dawn curfew that began more than two weeks ago, making Kenya's lockdown one of the deadliest in the world. But the true death toll is higher still: An untold number of others have died because of the curfew itself and the fear prompted by police batons and bullets.
That fear gripped Vidia Nduku Mati, 41, and her husband as the delivery date for their baby approached at the end of March.
They prayed that she wouldn't go into labor in the overnight hours -- but fate wouldn't cooperate. It was the deep of night, well into curfew, when the pain became unbearable.
[CORONAVIRUS: Click here for our complete coverage » arkansasonline.com/coronavirus]
First, the midwife refused to come, saying she feared the policemen in their rural community who a day earlier had beaten even the people who raced inside their homes, Vidia's husband recalled.
Their last resort to get to a hospital, a motorcycle taxi driver named Festus Nzuki, also declined, even though he was a close friend and could hear the pain in her voice over the phone.
Police had beaten his mother-in-law simply for sitting outside her house -- they were merciless to her in plain sight of her children, Nzuki said.
The couple resolved to wait until curfew lifted, but then Vidia's water broke, and blood gushed out instead.
"It was the longest wait of my life," said Mati Nyamai, Vidia's husband. "By the time Festus got us to the hospital in the morning, she was bleeding so much, she was drowning in blood."
While human-rights groups and police oversight agencies collect and verify reports of those killed directly by police during curfew enforcement -- a number that is already higher than the country's covid-19 death toll of 11 -- more, like Vidia and her unborn child, are dying uncounted.
"At least one a night since curfew began," said Wilfred Olal, who coordinates a network of social justice centers in slums across Kenya that is trying to keep track of curfew-related deaths since the measure was put into place 19 days ago. "To be honest, we've lost count. It's dozens. There are many more."
The Kenyan government's Independent Policing Oversight Authority says it has recorded 35 "watertight" cases of police brutality related to curfew enforcement, 12 of which resulted in death.
"It is spreading all over this country," said Jonathan Lompodui, the body's vice chairman.
The police's national spokesman, Charles Owino, and the government's spokesman, Cyrus Oguna, did not respond to requests for comment.
Government officials have largely refrained from speaking publicly about the curfew crackdowns.
President Uhuru Kenyatta briefly noted it in a news conference a day after the story of Yassin Moyo, a 13-year-old boy killed by police while on his own balcony, made headlines.
"I want to apologize to all Kenyans, maybe for some excesses that were conducted, or happened," he said before moving on.
Tallies from independent groups point to a spike in incidents of police brutality on the first night of curfew, March 27, and sustained cases in the nearly three weeks since.
Police brutality is common in Kenya's slums and small towns, where corrupt officers act with impunity.
A national survey in 2018 found that most Kenyans believed the biggest risk to their lives was violence by police. Since the inception of Kenya's police oversight body in 2011, less than 1% of the cases it has pursued have resulted in convictions.
According to Amnesty International, 624 Kenyans have been killed by police since 2007, including 49 already this year, with only 26 officers having been formally charged. Last year was the deadliest on record.
"The curfew is making the violence so much worse, because now they can be killing in the name of corona," Olal said. "They simply do not understand: You cannot fight corona with a baton and whip."
A Section on 04/17/2020