The main suspect in the shooting of a former Garissa county official died inside the Parklands Police Station cells on Thursday. Police officers who preferred anonymity said David Mwai, committed suicide, but did not give details of the circumstances. The suspect had been arrested alongside three other people, after police reviewed a CCTV footage extracted from surveillance cameras in the home of Idris Mukhtar, who is currently admitted at the Intensive Care Unit at a Nairobi hospital. GUN ATTACK Mr Mukhtar was shot in his car, at the parking of a restaurant near the Kileleshwa mosque where he had attended 8pm prayers on August 18. The footage, which Nation has also acquired, shows a gunman walk into the compound through the wide open gate, then to Mr Mukhtar's car where he shoots him three times and leaves calmly. He is dressed in brown jacket, a pair of jeans trousers and a white cap. The lone gunman then walks back to the gate and boards a waiting motorcycle. The security guard is seen walking towards the wide open gate, probably triggered by the gunshot sound. Police sources indicated that a silver- coloured car believed to have been trailing Mr Mukhtar for days before he was shot, had been found being repainted at a city garage. Officers from the Flying Squad of the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) seized the vehicle in Ngara, where the client had placed an order for it to be painted red. The number plate had also been changed and police believe that the car was set to be sold. SUSPECTS SEIZED Other suspects who are in police custody regarding the shooting are one of Garissa Governor Ali Korane's bodyguards, a soldier said to be a county security adviser, the owner of the car that was seized in Ngara, a bodaboda rider and a woman. On Tuesday, Governor Korane was questioned for hours at the County DCI offices located at the Nairobi Area Police Station. Also questioned; are one of his cousins and his close friend. Yesterday, a police source at the Parklands Police station said that the suspect who committed suicide had allegedly revealed details of the plan to kill Mr Mukhtar on Monday. Police, he said, are "relying on his testimony to piece together the plan to execute ex- executive member and a city lawyer."

Mr Mukhtar’s father Dr Aden Mukhtar and Mr Salah Yakub Farah, who served in the Garissa executive committee at the same time as Mr Mukhtar, told the Nation that the motive of the shooting must have been a case that was to be filed to challenge Governor Korane’s academic qualifications.

Mr Farah, a politician, said he was to be one of the 10 petitioners in the case and that Mr Mukhtar would have been the main petitioner.

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COURT CASE

"We were to file the case in court, a day after he was shot,” said Mr Farah, a former Environment executive at the Garissa County government.

Mr Farah and Mr Mukhtar had been serving in the cabinet of former Governor Nathif Jama. Mr Jama sacked them and one other executive during a reshuffle and they later sued the county government, after which the court awarded each of them Sh17 million.

Mr Mukhtar, 33, is a financial expert whose father described as a "very intelligent boy”.

"Doctors say he is responding well to medication. They say their priority for now is not to remove the bullet lodged in his head but to first stabilise him,” said Dr Mukhtar.

Both Dr Mukhtar and Mr Farah have recorded their statements with the police.