Standard Media Group Journalist Murdered

Police revealed that he was suspected to have been killed elsewhere and the body dumped on the site.

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Dec 22, 2022 - 08:37
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Standard Media Group Journalist Murdered
Standard Media Group offices along Mombasa Road. /STANDARD DIGITAL

A journalist attached to the Standard Media Group (SMG) was on Thursday morning, December 22 found dead.

The body of Moses Okiror Omusolo, a business journalist at the Mombasa Road-based media house, was found inside a ditch along the busy Kang'undo Road with a deep cut on the head.

Police revealed that he was suspected to have been killed elsewhere and the body dumped on the site. It was not immediately established the circumstances that led to the murder of the journalist who also wrote articles for the Nation Media Group (NMG).

The late Standard Media Group journalist Moses Okiror Omusolo. /FILE

Omusolo was engaged at the time and plans were underway for a wedding that would have taken place in February 2023. He graduated in 2013 from Masinde Muliro University.

Police added that a black backpack was recovered next to his body and had personal documents that assisted the police to identify him.

“The body of the deceased was taken to the morgue and currently, investigations are ongoing to ascertain what might have transpired,” Adamson Bungei, the Nairobi County police boss said.

Colleagues while mourning him described him as a free spirit who mingled freely with colleagues and had the perfect understanding of the Financial Markets.

"Having worked with him, he was very calm, hardly offended anyone, and was very approachable despite being a senior in the career. If you read the Financial Markets section (stocks, Forex, Unit Trusts) he's the one who did the compilation," one of them described the scribe from the Iteso community in Busia County.

His death comes just a year after another journalist identified as Gatonye Gathura was found dead, and his body was at the Naivasha Sub-County Referral Hospital morgue. He was a veteran Health and Science journalist who also worked for SMG.

Gatonye went missing on October 21, 2021, and his body was booked at the morgue on October 26, 2021, as “an unknown male adult.” Police had revealed at the time that his body had been found dumped on the Naivasha- Mai Mahiu Road on the same day he went missing.

It took the intervention of the Registrar of Persons to use fingerprints to establish the identity of the late. Police believed that he might have been strangled as a copper wire was found tied around his neck.

On August 24, 2022, the Media Council of Kenya (MCK) revealed 43 incidences of assault on journalists during the August 9 general elections.

"Unfortunately, MCK also observed increased cases of press freedom violations including denial to access voting areas, critical information from relevant public bodies, profiling of journalists and media outlets, online trolling of journalists and media outlets and in some cases physical attacks on journalists. At least 43 journalists from various media houses were affected by various forms of harassment in 12 incidences documented by the Council.

"Majority of these (37) were involved in incidences that denied them an opportunity to easily access their designated polling and tallying centres while the others included arrest, threats and harassment," MCK stated in its report dubbed Media Performance & Press Freedom Violations Pre, During & Post the August 9 General Election in Kenya.

MCK had called on the police and other agencies to expedite investigations and bring the culprits to book. 

Journalists covering the swearing-in ceremony of President William Ruto at Kasarani Stadium on September 13, 2022. /MEDIA COUNCIL OF KENYA

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