Kin: Who’s the client that killed Banana taxi-man?

A family in Banana is still moaning the death of their 25-year-old son, who they laid to rest on Tuesday, a week after his brutal murder.

March 16, begun like any other day for Erick Kahiu who had been in the taxi business for just over a year.

According to his colleagues, Kahiu appeared to be expecting a client’s call since morning and he even shelved washing his taxi opting to just dust it instead.

They said he received a call at about noon and immediately after, jumped into his car saying “I will be back soon” as he drove off.

Sadly, this was not to be because six hours later, Kahiu’s mutilated body was discovered at Mai Mahiu, about 50km from his home near Banana shopping centre.

WHAT HAPPENED

It remains a mystery to family and friends what happened between noon and 6pm of that fateful day and they are faced with more questions than answers.

“We still do not know who the client was that Kahiu ferried on that day or what he was doing in Mai Mahiu,” his uncle Charles Waruinge said in an interview with The Standard on Friday.

He said they were later to learn from Naivasha police that a villager had stumbled on a body in a hyena-infested bush at Satellite area of Mai Mahiu and alerted the local chief who in turn informed the police.

The yet unidentified male body had blind-folded eyes, a piece of cloth stuffed in the mouth and both hands tied together.

Waruinge said police retrieved the body and transported it to Naivasha Hospital mortuary.

While Kahiu lay dead at the morgue, his family back home was growing anxious after night fall came and he was nowhere to be seen.

Waruinge said his nephew’s routine was pretty predictable and his parents, Jane Muthoni and Leonard Njenga, had learnt to expect him home by 10pm after closing his business.

As the hours stretched on, his mother grew restless and called his mobile phone severally.

“I became anxious because it was getting late into the night and Kahiu was still not home. I kept calling but his phone was not going through. I eventually retired to bed believing that maybe he had gone on a long journey assignment,” Muthoni said.

However, day break offered no reprieve, no one knew where Kahiu was and his phone was still switched off.

His father decided to file a missing person report at Karuri Police Station where officers immediately swung into action.

They liaised with Kahiu’s mobile provider who tracked his phone and told them its final signal was emanating from around Mai Mahiu.

Mzee Njenga was advised to seek help from police in Naivasha and together with his wife and Waruinge, they went to Naivasha on March 17.

Waruinge said they met with the area’s police who alerted them of the discovery of a male body that had been recovered the previous day.

SHOCKING NEWS

At the mortuary, the parents positively identified their son’s body and it was immediately transferred to Kenyatta University mortuary as news of the death started to sink in.

Kahiu was the only son in a family of two children and has been described by his family as a “harmless person”.

“God had favoured him with many customers and he knew how to relate well with them,” his distraught mother told us.

His death was also received with shock by his colleagues, who were the last people to see him alive, and the circumstances surrounding his demise have now filled them with fear.

“We do not know who will be next because it is difficult to read a client’s real intentions. Maybe the killer or killers had been Kahiu’s customers for a while and were able to win his trust,” said a taxi driver who requested to remain anonymous.

The family has appealed to police to unmask the killers.