'Mourning bones' stopping family from using land

 Mau Mau fighters’ skulls and bones discovered on a land in Ndeiya, Kiambu County. [Photo: James Mwangi]

A family in Kiambu County has threatened to exhume and dispose of the remains of purported Mau Mau freedom fighters to enable them utilise their land which was turned into a mass grave for those killed by imperial forces during the struggle for independence in the 1950s and 1960s. 

Teresia Gacheri, 96 (pictured right), from Thigio village in Ndeiya, owns the land and has since subdivided it. She swore that nothing will stop her planned mass exhumation and disposal of the skulls and bones since “we are always promised compensation or relocation by the authorities. But as soon as they walk out of my home, they go silent. We are told to identify land but they decline to pay for it. We have been to the Ministry of Lands but we are ever taken round in circles. They have done this for over 10 years but now we are now tired.” 

John Mbugua who has since been apportioned part of the land said the situation places them  between a stone and a hard burial place  because if “we dig out the remains, it becomes a problem and if we preserve it, we suffer yet we have idle land. How much would it cost the government to relocate us from this four-acre piece of land? If the government does not care, why should we?” posed Mbugua.

Gacheri recalls that, “Fifteen years ago, we could bump into a whole scary skeleton exposed by erosion. It was scary, but over time, we got used to it and it has not been big deal using sections of the grave. We even want to build houses and plant crops there.” John Maina, 76, a Kikuyu elder however warned that exhuming and scattering the remains would be disastrous because “Those bones are still mourning. We need a ritual to appease and give them a decent burial”. The family however bemoaned that their land has been turned into grounds for research by locals and foreigners. He says that leaders, including Mau Mau spokesman Gitu wa Kahengeri and Kiambu governor William Kabogo have visited them but haven’t kept their promises. An officer at the Kiambu government told The Nairobian that they were following up the matter to see how they could assist but insisted the matter was largely under the National Lands Commission.

An officer at the National Museums of Kenya explained to The Nairobian that, “We can only take care of it (the land) if it is gazetted and declared a monument site.”