Muthoni wa Kirima’s last stand an act of moral rearmament

It seems preposterous to be seized by a matter of one woman’s hair when there are more pressing issues of the day. For instance, men and women are walking around town carrying jerricans, looking for fuel to power their vehicles.

But when the woman in question is the irreverent Field Marshall Muthoni wa Kirima, the heroine of the Mau Mau struggle whose hair remained uncut for 70 straight years — an enduring symbol of resistance against oppression — and her barber is the founding First Lady of the nation, Mama Ngina Kenyatta, this is a neat confluence of confounding conundrums.