Angry women raid drinking dens in Narok, Kenya

By Kipchumba Kemei

Business at a trading centre in Narok, Kenya stalled after incensed women raided several illegal breweries.

The angry women numbering more than 100 beat up drunkards and poured hundreds of litres of chang’aa (an illicit brew), before protesting against laxity on the part of police and the Provincial Administration.

They disrupted free flow of traffic on the Narok-Maasai Mara road demanding that the Government take action against the brewers.

The women reacted a week after a resident died allegedly after consuming the liquor at the Uaso Nyiro centre.

"We acted because the Provincial Administration ignored our pleas. Apart from killing our husbands, the brew has also rendered young men useless, and they do not perform their matrimonial duties," said the women’s representative Ms Peris Nkoitoi.

Many temporary structures were destroyed as the women, armed with an assortment of crude weapons, moved from house to house in search of illicit brews.

Those who were found in the dens were stripped naked and roughed up.

The local District Public Health Officer John Towett said most of the drinks served in the dens were laced with preservatives, which were harmful to the consumers.