14 students from Kijabe High School were on Thursday, July 27, released on a Ksh20,000 cash bail each, for rioting and causing malicious damage to property valued at millions of shillings.
Limuru Law Court Principal Magistrate Monicah Mugeru granted the cash bail to each of the students in a ruling she rendered on Thursday afternoon.
Mugeru further adjourned the case until the students sat for their Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) slated to kick off in October 2023.
The visibly perplexed young men were charged with conspiracy to commit a misdemeanor and malicious damage of property contrary to provisions of the Constitution.
Members of the fourth estate were kicked out of the courtroom during the hearing of the case.
It is still unclear why the students rioted and our calls and text messages to the school's deputy principal went unanswered.
Kijabe High School also made headlines in September 2021, after its board was forced to close the school indefinitely after a fire that gutted a dormitory.
The fire, which broke out at the dormitory housing forty students, led to the destruction of property of an unknown value including books, clothes and beddings.
The incident came after 258 Makueni Boys High School students got suspended in 2021 for rioting. The students were protesting against compulsory monthly haircuts by the school.
In another instance, students in Narok county in May 2023, rioted after learning that their headteacher was transferred. They argued that the decision was ill-informed as the headteacher had led the growth of the school since its inception. Reportedly, the new headteacher was not received well at his previous station where TSC had posted him.
Moreover, students of Litein Boys' High School based in Kericho County took to the streets in May this year over the change of entertainment schedule. The administration resulted in closing the institution indefinitely. The riot culminated in the destruction of window panes on the laboratories and administration block.
