Police profiling of dreadlock men stirs outrage on social media, Wanavokali’s Ricky got arrested for wearing locs.
By Nilan Sande- KRN Correspondent
The Wanavokali band known for their “Rhumba” song released in July 2021 took to their Instagram page yesterday Friday 20, demanding justice for one of their band member who was arrested by plainclothes police.
Ricky who wears his dreadlocks with pride was single-handedly chosen among his other bandmates by three plainclothes police at around 3 pm.
The three were cornered by police as they were crossing the road at Globe roundabout, Nairobi CBD. He was grabbed and handcuffed by the police without letting him know why he was being arrested.
In a trending video, a female band member who was with Ricky, narrated how the police targeted Ricky.
“We were walking peacefully in town, then a guy grabs Ricky by the sweater for no reason and demanded to frisk him out of the blues and we were like why chose only the guy with the dreadlocks?” she said.
Ricky could be heard in the background demanding answers as to why he was being arrested without being told the reason for the arrest.
“What have I done? Why can’t I walk peacefully in my dreadlocks? Why are you threatening me?” he said
He was taken to Central Police for questioning.
Captain Charisma famously known as Luhya Heat, who is also a musician in Kenya, on Saturday 21, also confirmed an incident where he was also harassed by police for flouting curfew rules despite being badly injured at that time.
He was made to push his bike to the police station, the bike earlier had a breakdown due to the accident and he was made to spend a night in the police cells.
The Kitengela four who were murdered on August 8 were having dreadlocks were brutally killed for a mistaken identity for being cattle thieves.
Kenyans on social media are now asking police to stop profiling people for their lifestyles.
“They (police) should stop this kind of nonsense, I think they need exposure when it comes to dealing with such issue, it is a shame,” Rafael Kinju said.
Our freedom fighters had dreadlocks, locs has a spiritual meaning to purity. Let us all embrace unity and stop the inhumane act of profiling our brothers and sisters in dreadlocks, not all have bad intentions.
