Following excessive violence used by police Nakuru County, Kenya on 10 April 2025, ARTICLE 19 calls for an immediate and transparent investigation into the police actions against journalists, artists, and the public. We call on the government to explain and be held accountable for its attempts to censor artistic expression, and to block the public’s access to information.
ARTICLE 19 condemns Kenyan officials’ use of violence and intimidation against students, the public, and journalists. We call on the policing authority to carry out immediate and transparent investigations into the actions, and for the government to be held accountable for its attempts to censor political commentary, artistic expression, and to block the public’s access to information.
In March 2025, the Kenyan government ordered that the Butere Girls High School be excluded from participating in the annual Kenya Schools and Colleges National Drama and Film Festival 2025, a move that the country’s freedom of expression and human rights community say was an act of retaliation for the staging of a play that explores the process of recovering from civil conflict and the government’s harsh response to political dissent.
The play, Echoes of War, was performed at the festival’s regional level, and qualified for the national level festival at Kiribon High School in Nakuru County in April. Its creators say it imagines how a nation can recover from a civil conflict and transform its social services and the justice system, and looks at how the government response to political dissent has choked the life out of young people and put the future of the next generation at risk. It also, they say, examines how technology influences political systems, while highlighting the impact young people have in driving social transformation.
On 8 April 2025, the Kisii High Court ordered a stay on the ban on Echoes of War and allowed for the play to be performed in its original form at the national festival. The court decision reaffirms the constitutional rights of all people in Kenya to freedom of expression, which includes freedom to seek, receive or impart information or ideas; including freedom of artistic creativity (Article 33 of the Kenya Constitution 2010).
However, as the play was due to be performed at its scheduled time on 10 April, armed police in riot gear arrived at the venue, blocking audiences and the media, as well as the play’s director and writer, Cleophas Malala, from entering the hall. Authorities also barred the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) crew from entering the hall to film the play, despite this being normal practice during the annual festival.
Police used teargas and batons to disperse the crowd and prevent media coverage of the event, blocking media workers, who were wearing signs clearly identifying them as press, from entering the theatre. Among the journalists police physically attacked were Maryanne Nyambura (Citizen TV), Peter Kimani (KTN), Robert Maina (Inooro Tv), Joseph Kipsang, whose camera was destroyed during the incident), Kennedy Gachuhi (Standard Group), and Evans Asiba (Citizen TV). Several of the journalists sustained injuries, as did members of the public.
Authorities also arrested the director and the play’s author, Cleophas Malala, who is also a former senator for Kakamega.
The actions directly contravened the court order issued on 8 April, which specifically provided for the students to have access, and to be accompanied by their school teachers and the play’s director. In defiance, the students took to the stage. Instead of performing the play, they recited the national anthem as an act of resistance. Members of the public protested outside the venue, stating that they and the media had the right to attend the national festival.
The actions of the festival officials and the police are not simply illegal, they are a deliberate attempt to curtail freedom of expression and artistic expression and to suppress press freedom and the media. Furthermore, they violate the foundational principles of Kenya’s constitutional democracy.
The Kenyan government is no stranger to limiting freedom of expression, especially the freedom of young people sharing their opinions on the state of the nation they are living in. Authorities’ exclusion of the play from the festival is a reminder of 2013, when a school performance of a play, Shackles of Doom, was also banned from the national festival. In 2013, the matter was resolved by a court of law, with the ban being lifted and the play featuring in the National Drama Festival in Mombasa county.
ARTICLE 19 calls for:
- The Independent Policing Oversight Authority to conduct immediate and transparent investigations into the police actions at the national festival, as the attack against the journalists contravenes the constitutional rights to a free press
- The National Police Service to adhere to constitutional human rights principles in public order management and ensure officers found culpable of violations are held to account.
- The Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Interior to issue a formal apology to the Butere Girl’s Drama team in recognition of the student’s freedom of opinion and freedom to artistic expression.