Businesses in Eastleigh, Nairobi, were paralysed for a better part of Thursday morning while residents staged peaceful protests in the wake of the mysterious murders of three women; a mother and her two daughters.
Residents turned up in their hundreds and blocked key roads in and out of Eastleigh to demand justice for Waris Daud, her 25-year-old daughter Amina Abdirashid, and her 12-year-old niece Nuseiba Dahir.
Videos obtained by Kenyans.co.ke brought to perspective the powerful impact of the peaceful protests, as vehicles were forced to seek alternative routes in Eastleigh's Ninth and 12th street.
Area Member of Parliament Yusuf Hassan was also at the frontline demanding justice for the slain women while businessmen and women temporarily halted their work to show support.
Abdikarim Hussein, a resident in Eastleigh spoke exclusively to Kenyans.co.ke noting that tensions have been high in the neighbourhood since the discovery of the bodies.
"Businesses have been closing early. Everyone is just scared because you don't know what to expect with everything that has been happening," our source who preferred to remain anonymous stated, noting that the three women's case was only one of the high-profile ones that hit mainstream media.
The Somali community in Eastleigh, who constitute a large chunk of the population in the constituency, are the most fearful amid a recent spate of murders.
The bodies of the three women were discovered in three different locations on Monday, October 21, in what looked like a well-executed murder plan.
The mother's remains were found in Machakos while another body was discovered in Bahati. The third body was discovered several kilometres away in Parklands.
The Directorate of Criminal Investigations has since launched a probe into the killings with CCTV footage providing a crucial clue in the case. The footage captures the moment the two young ladies entered a taxi at around 9 pm last Monday. That was the last time they were seen alive.
Despite the discovery of their bodies in several different locations, authorities have reason to believe the murders were committed by the same perpetrator.
The harrowing murders of the three ladies raised alarm over a worrying trend of abductions and subsequent killings of women which has spiked in recent months.
Only days ago, the body of Seth Nyakio Njeri, daughter of a Kirinyaga MCA, was discovered in a rental apartment in the Biafra area, Thika County, on Sunday, October 20.
Christine Nyakio, a 24-year-old woman from Ngong also recently went missing only for her body to be discovered on Monday, October 21 near a swamp.
The spate of murders has prompted a response from the Federation of Women Lawyers in Kenya (FIDA) as the body urged the government to marshall all necessary and available resources towards the investigation and prosecution of all perpetrators of femicide.
