Police Raid MSJC ahead of Book Launch. 4 officers, led by OCS A. Kipchumba from the Mathare Police has stormed into the MSJC offices. They began questioning and harassing our cadres while also making threatening calls to halt the launch of our book: FROM MAUMAU TO RUTO MUST GO

Police raided the offices of the Mathare Social Justice Centre (MSJC) on Wednesday, harassing staff and making threatening calls to organisers just days before the launch of a book tracing Kenya’s resistance from the Mau Mau uprising to the current “Ruto Must Go” movement, the centre has reported. Four officers stormed the premises, interrogating cadres and disrupting planning for the launch of From Mau Mau to Ruto Must Go: Essays on Kenya’s Struggle Against Imperialism, which documents opposition to an “oppressive tax regime” under President William Ruto. The raid follows a pattern of state repression against grassroots activists. In May 2024, police arrested 26 MSJC organisers following a demonstration against flood-related evictions in Mathare, where residents’ homes were demolished without relocation assistance. The centre has long documented police violence, recording over 800 extrajudicial killings between 2013 and 2016.