Security agencies recover 106 cattle from banditry incident that left herder injured in Turkana
The recovered animals were found at the Nayakori area, five kilometers in Pokot North Sub county.
Security agencies have recovered 106 cows out of the 114 believed to have been stolen from Pokot North during a raid at Nakalimon village in Loima Subcounty, Turkana County, in an incident that left an 18-year-old herdsman injured at his lower back by a bullet shot.
Confirming the incident, Police Spokesperson Michael Muchiri said the herder, Lokoro Lokong, was taken to Lodwar County and Referral hospital where he was treated and is currently out of danger.
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"Police have increased patrols in the area, and normalcy has returned," he said after the incident was recorded at Loya Police Station on Friday evening.
The recovered animals were found at the Nayakori area, five kilometers in Pokot North Sub county.
Security agencies deployed in the ongoing Operation Maliza Uhalifu, North Rift, have adopted the recovery of every stolen animal amongst strategies to discourage livestock theft and raids in the region.
This, amongst other initiatives, has seen them sustain a decline in cattle rustling activities since the launch of the operation in 2022.
These are activities that have, for centuries, remained embedded in the cultures of the Pokot, the Marakwet, the Tugen, the Samburu, the Turkana, Borana, and the Somali, to name but a few major protagonists in the corridors of the North Rift and extensive swathes of Upper Eastern.
Other strategies that are helping end the vice include embarking on the process of instilling the young population of the communities involved on alternative ways of life amongst them education.
The work being done by the military, including building of new classrooms where there were none, putting up health facilities and boreholes has seen an emergence of a more hopeful, confident North Rift.
Security agencies believe that if these efforts get sustained and followed up by a sustained mental "reset", it is possible to have future generations of young men who would no longer glorify the outdated cultural practice.
On their part, the forces credit the deployment of better equipment, including mine resistance ambush vehicles for troops movement, use of drones and enhanced technological support for those venturing into caves, valleys and hills that were the domain of localised cattle thieves to the recorded success of their work.
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