\u00a0A church service attended by Democratic Party of Kenya (DCP) leader Rigathi Gachagua was disrupted on Sunday by violent clashes between rival youth groups outside the African Independent Pentecostal Church of Africa (AIPCA) in Kiamworia, Gatundu South.<\/p>\n
Eyewitnesses said the groups, armed with batons, engaged in a standoff outside the church, prompting police to deploy teargas to disperse the youths. <\/p>\n
The confrontation also disrupted traffic along the Kiamworia-Gatundu South road and resulted in a minibus being vandalized. The driver was accused of ferrying the youths to the area.<\/p>\n
Several members of the congregation suffered teargas inhalation as the fumes spread inside the church, with worshippers describing the scene as chaotic.<\/p>\n
“Tumejipata tumetupiwa teargas ndani ya kanisa,” said Ruth Wanjiku, a church member. Salome Wachuka added, “Tumeletewa hadi goons kwa kanisa.”<\/p>\n
Addressing the incident, Gachagua accused the government of allowing the disruption, alleging that state authorities sent \u201cgoons\u201d to the church while leaving police to protect them.<\/p>\n
“Mbona unatuma goons kanisani? Na wewe IG unawacha polisi wana protect goons,” he said.<\/p>\n
During the service, Gachagua also defended former President Uhuru Kenyatta against claims of attempting to divide the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), noting Kenyatta\u2019s role in securing votes for his party in past elections.<\/p>\n
“Sio Uhuru ambaye anagawanya chama\u2026 Uhuru alisaidia Baba kupata zaidi ya kura milioni moja\u2026 na tukiumana pia tutamuita atusaidie atoke retire,” he stated.<\/p>\n
Gachagua further criticized some leaders for failing to invest in education infrastructure, highlighting his party\u2019s initiatives in building schools.<\/p>\n
“Wanapewa pesa mingi na hawajengi shule\u2026 sisi tumejenga shule na watoto wetu wanapelekwa kusoma Turkana na Kericho,” he said.<\/p>\n
He was accompanied by Kiambu Senator Karungo Thang\u2019wa, Murang\u2019a Senator Joe Nyutu, and Kajiado North MP Onesmus Ngogoyo, among other leaders.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u00a0A church service attended by Democratic Party of Kenya (DCP) leader Rigathi Gachagua was disrupted on Sunday by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[7800,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-17819","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-kenya","8":"tag-citizen-digital-citizentv-kenya","9":"tag-kenya"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}