Technician Arrested, Says Was Paid Sh3,000, Implicates 2 Police Officers For Tampering With CCTV Systems At Central After Ojwang Murder

KahawatunguJune 13, 2025Read original

A man who was called to tamper with the CCTV system at Nairobi’s Central Police Station after the murder of teacher Albert Ojwang was arrested in a police operation.

Police said the technician identified as Kelvin Mutisya Matava was flushed out of his Saika home on Friday June 13 morning in an operation.

He is the second person to be arrested over the incident as police hunt for at least four more.

Those wanted include the OCS Central who has gone underground, police said.

He is said to have paid Matava Sh3,000 for tampering with the CCTV system that had captured events before and after Ojwang was brought to station on June 7.

The Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA) had revealed that the hard disks of CCTV systems at Nairobi’s Central Police Station were replaced and formatted.
IPOA chairperson Isaac Hassan told the National Assembly’s Security Committee that digital video recorder (DVR) logs showed the discs were changed and formatted on June 8, 2025, at 07:23:29 and 07:23:48 hours.

Hassan said the move was part of a well-planned scheme to erase surveillance footage linked to the events leading to Ojwang’s death while in police custody.
“Somebody called someone to come and switch off a particular section, but he said he could only shut down the entire system,” Hassan told the committee.
He also disclosed that the CCTV hard disks had been replaced in what appeared to be a calculated scheme to conceal evidence.
“The DVR logs indicated that the operating discs had been changed and formatted on June 8, 2025, at 07:23:48 hours and 07:23:29 hours,’’ said Hassan.
According to the Inspector General of Police Douglas Kanja, Ojwang was booked at the Central Police Station under the Occurrence Book number 136/7/6/2025 at 21:35hours on June 7, 2025.

The technician told police a lady who had contracted him in 2024 to install the CCTV cameras at Central Police Station supplied all the materials with a total number of 25 CCTV cameras and server/Digital Video Recorder (DVR) with a storage capacity for 30 days as per the instructions of the then OCS.

He installed the cameras at the report office, corridor leading to the cells, all corridors in the two floors and on the parking yard from the entrance. Since then, he added, he has been called to Central Police Station several times by police for maintenance of the CCTV system, which has been occasional.

“On June 8, 2025, at 6:22 am I received a phone call from xxx who requested me to proceed to Central Police Station immediately. Upon arrival she took me to the office of the OCS where the server/Digital Video Recorder (DVR) for the surveillance cameras is located.”

“The OCS was present and they requested me to

delete the video footages for 6th and 7th June, 2025. I informed them deleting footage for specific days is not possible and the only option was to format the storage/ hard drive which would delete everything stored and restore it to factory settings,” he said.

He added he did not remove anything from the DVR system and upon completion of the assignment, the OCS gave him Sh3,000 for the work done.

On the same day the female officer called him again twice at 7:55 Pmand 7:56 Pm but he did not answer her calls.

On June 9, 2025, at 6:28 am, he said, he received a phone call from the same female officer who requested him to once again proceed to Central Police Station with a new hard drive so that I can replace the old one at the CCTV server/Digital Video Recorder.

“She further insisted that I should not wear a reflector or any clothing that would indicate I am a technician.”

“Since at that time the shops where I could source the hard drive were yet to open, I first proceeded there without a hard drive but only to find that somebody had already opened the DVR machine and hard drive interfered with since it was not the way I had left it the previous day,” he said.

The female officer told him to come back later in the evening.

At around 12:07 pm she called him and asked if he was available but at that time he was working at Westlands.

She further informed him she had given his mobile phone number to an IPOA officer who wanted assistance to retrieve CCTV footages.

The IPOA official called and requested him to proceed there to assist them.

Instead , the technician sent a colleague because he was busy at work.

“I was also worried since I had seen on social media that a person had died while at Central Police Station under mysterious circumstances and taking into consideration the instructions I had been given by the OCS and Sharon to format and delete everything from the CCTV hard drive/ storage.”

The technician was the second person to be arrested over the saga.

A police Constable was Thursday arrested after being implicated in the saga.

Ojwang was clobbered to death at the station on June 7 at night.

He had been arrested in Homabay and brought to Nairobi over a post he made on X.

The matter is under probe. A group staged a protest on Thursday demanding justice for Ojwang. The protest turned chaotic as police engaged the group in running battles.