Father John Kaiser with schoolchildren at Lolgorian Catholic Church in western Kenya last year. He was an outspoken human rights activist and critic of the Kenyan government. Photograph: AP
Kenyan police have started an investigation into the murder of a Catholic missionary priest who had publicly denounced several senior Kenyan political figures. Human rights campaigners and Catholic clergy fear his death was politically motivated.
The body of the American priest, Father John Kaiser (57), was found outside the town of Naivasha on Thursday morning with a gunshot wound to the head.
An Irish nun, Sister Laura Brangan, said he had already received death threats. "He had been told by people in government to be careful and that his life was in danger," she said. He asked Maasai warriors to protect him and had bought a licenced gun, she added.
Father Francis Mwangi, the last known person to see Father Kaiser alive, said the Mill Hill missionary looked tired and agitated on the night he disappeared. Father Kaiser, whose mother was Irish and father was German, was an outspoken civil rights campaigner who made enemies of many senior politicians during his 36-year stay in Kenya.
Last year he told an inquiry into the 1994 clashes in Rift Valley province that two government ministers, Mr Nicholas Biwott and Mr William Ole Ntimama, had orchestrated the tribal killings for political purposes.
He also brought to light allegations that a Minister of State, Mr Julius Sunkuli, had raped an underage cousin. Mr Sunkuli has denied the charge and is currently on trial. The minister, who has not resigned his cabinet position, was once reported as saying "Father Kaiser hates me like poison".
Last November the Kenyan government tried to deport him following the expiry of his resident permit but withdrew the order following protests from human rights groups, the Catholic church and the US embassy.
Father Kaiser's body was taken to Nairobi yesterday for an autopsy. A spokesman for the US embassy said that an FBI officer had started to work on the case with Kenyan police.
An Irish missionary, Brother Larry Timmons, was also shot dead in the Rift Valley province in 1997 in mysterious circumstances.
Sister Brangan said that human rights campaigners in Kenya would not be deterred by Father Kaiser's death. "We feel we owe it to him to work for life and death. He has set an example of courage for the rest of us," she said.