Mandera North MP Bashir Abdullahi has issued a clarification following public backlash over remarks he made in Parliament regarding the BBC documentary Blood Parliament, which exposed police officers allegedly involved in the killing of young protestors during the June 2024 anti-Finance Bill demonstrations.
Over the past 72 hours, Abdullahi has faced widespread criticism for stating that “we sympathised and moved on,” a comment many interpreted as dismissive of the lives lost during the protests.
His statement was seen as suggesting that Kenyans should no longer dwell on the tragic events.
Speaking in Parliament on Tuesday, Abdullahi said:
“BBC World Service has attended to this matter in a way that also looked at Kenyan society as something discriminatory.
Our media stations picked it up without questioning how BBC aired the story.
It happens all over the world people are killed, our people were killed, we sympathised, we moved on.”
In response to the uproar, the MP took to social media to clarify that his remarks had been taken out of context.
He emphasized that his criticism was aimed at what he described as selective outrage by Western media, which, he argued, often condemns events in countries like Kenya while remaining silent on atrocities elsewhere.
“My remarks were directed at the biased narrative of some Western media, who are quick to condemn acts in other countries but stay silent on the massacre of Palestinians and other global injustices.
It is this silence, this hypocrisy, that I was highlighting,” he wrote.
Abdullahi denied that he was minimizing the deaths that occurred during the protests.
Instead, he expressed support for a transparent investigation into the events of June 25 and urged accountability for those found culpable.
“I support the call for an independent investigation into the events of June 25, and I demand that those responsible be held accountable,” he said.
“If my words hurt the bereaved families or any Kenyan, I offer my deepest and unconditional apology as a servant leader.”
His comments echo sentiments expressed by Dagoretti South MP John Kiarie, who also criticized the BBC documentary and questioned whether the broadcaster was promoting a foreign agenda.
“The BBC is funded by taxpayers in Britain. We want to know whether it speaks for the people of Britain or is pushing a particular narrative in Kenya,” Kiarie said.
The BBC’s Blood Parliament documentary has drawn significant attention, amassing over 4.7 million views on YouTube.
The investigation identified police officers linked to the killing of three protestors after analyzing over 5,000 images to reconstruct the sequence of events.
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