Heartrending tales: Families cry out for justice

Ida Odinga (left) and Nominated MP Dennitah Ghati during the vigil at the University of Nairobi. [Edward Kiplimo, Standard]

Families of the more than 40 women killed in recent past painfully narrated circumsatnces under which they lost their loved ones during the vigil at the University of Nairobi.

They said most of the slain women were young and promising. “She was my only hope. She was the one who used to care for me,” said Elizabeth Moraa, mother to the late police officer Hellen Kwamboka, who was based at Parliament. Ms Moraa fought back tears as she narrated how Kwamboka was murdered a week ago in Umoja. Father to the late Caroline Mwatha, a rights activist who went missing before her family found her body at City Mortuary said: “We see her children everyday as we prepare them for school and I remember my daughter.”

The mother to the late Ivy Wangechi, declined the invitation, saying she was yet to overcome the grief.

“Ivy’s mum couldn’t join us; she is still devastated,” said Caroline Nyakinya, the aunt to the late Ivy, who was hacked to death a month ago in Eldoret. yakinya said the fact that the deceased’s life was snuffed out when she was due to graduate with a medical degree in December is troubling the family.

For all the families, the agony of search for justice compounds their pain. None of the killers of the five women whose families spoke at the vigil on Friday night, has been convicted.

Threatening calls

The late Mwatha’s father recounted the pain of walking in the corridors of justice. “It bothers us that the suspects were released. When I was at the mortuary I heard a police officer telling the mortuary attendant to change the records. So much information in the records had been altered, which means the police were aware of who killed my daughter,” he claimed adding his son fled the country after receiving threatening phone calls.

Kelly, the cousin of Rhoda Mumbi, suspected to have been murdered by her husband Nicholas Koskei on July 8, 2017, said the family’s fight for justice has been long, painful and unrewarding so far. “We have been going round and round for two years now. When Rhoda’s boys grow up, what will tell them we did with the man who killed their mother?” Kelly posedd.

Cabinet Secretaries Fred Mataing’i and Margaret Kobia, Governor Anne Waiguru, Women Representatives Esther Passaris and Gathoni wa Muchoma, MPs, MCAs and leaders at the event regretted that the families are yet to find justice.

“We don’t understand why these cases have gone quiet,” said Chief Administrative Secretary for Public Service, Youth and Gender Affairs Rachel Shebesh.

Shebesh noted that out of cases before court only the husband of the late Caroline Mwanza Mutunga, Gilbert Kapule Oketch, was sentenced in October 2018 to 30 years in jail for the murder. Families and leaders decried the fabricated stories about victims saying this was insensitive.