Meet the retired livestock officer who documented Kibaki's life

Joseph Githaiga 75, at his home in Aguthii Village, Tetu in Nyeri. Githaiga was a livestock station officer in Nyeri when he met President Mwai Kibaki. [Kibata Kihu/Standard]

President Mwai Kibaki was nearing the end of his term in 2013 when a retired livestock extension officer walked into our office in Nyeri.

Joseph Githaiga was 63-years old and he had been to the Central Provincial Commissioner's office which referred him to the independent media.

Githaiga had a small request in his arms. It was a pink A4 size file which had dozens of newspaper clippings about Kibaki since the late 1960s.

They were carefully preserved. What caught our attention was a photo of one Charles Wambugu standing alone with a framed photo of Dr Godfrey Muriuki at Gatugi Polling Station during the March 1988 discredited mlolongo elections.

The caption said Wambugu was Dr Muriuki's agent at the polling station during the elections in which voters queued behind the portrait of their candidate to be counted. It was Kanu's idea of a homegrown, low expense democracy.

Back to Gatugi, according to the story, no one joined Dr Muriuki's queue at the polling station as the sole rival, Vice President Mwai Kibaki's queue, stretched for hundreds of metres.

At the counting hall at the Nyeri Social Hall Kibaki got into a tussle with a district commissioner and made his famous remark: "Even rigging needs some intelligence."

There was also an East African Standard cutting of a story about a Kenya Airways jet landing at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport on November 19, 1984, during a power blackout. 

The flight had a returning delegation from an Organisation of African Unity (OAU) summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia that included VP Kibaki, Foreign Affairs Minister Elijah Mwangale and Assistant Ministers Paul Sumbi and Omar Soba.

The story said the flight captain only identified as Chepkwony only broke the news of the blackout after the plane had landed safely.

Githaiga also had two copies of the defunct Weekly Review and  Drum magazine with Kibaki prominently on the cover.

The March 14, 1977, Weekly Review screamed "Kibaki's challenge" with a cover price of only Sh3.50. 

He was denying that he had been approached by the World Bank for a prominent role and was considering leaving his political job as Kenya's Finance Minister and Othaya MP.

Joseph Githaiga 75, at his home in Aguthii Village, Tetu in Nyeri. Githaiga was a livestock station officer in Nyeri when he met President Mwai Kibaki. [Kibata Kihu/Standard]

In September 1978, a month after founder president Mzee Jomo Kenyatta's death, the weekly screamed 'Kibaki: The rising star' with the cover price now Sh4.50. 

In April 1983, the Drum headline was 'Mwai Kibaki. Man of Action'.

Archiving clippings

Mzee Githaiga used to buy the Daily Nation and Standard as he worked in various districts including Murang'a, Embu, Nyeri and Kirinyaga those days. 

But over the years, he had developed a keen interest in archiving clippings and has over 80 files of diverse personalities ranging from Ewart Grogan to Jomo Kenyatta, second president Daniel Arap Moi, former MPs Phoebe Asiyo, Chelegat Mutai, former AG Charles Njonjo and many others.

Those are carefully curated at his corrugated iron sheet roofed log cabin at his Kiandondo village in Aguthi/Giaki ward in Tetu, Nyeri County.

But it was Kibaki he had been passionate about and had wished to present the file to him at his retirement in 2013.

"Maybe this will help the former president lighten up and perhaps [use it] while he is penning his memoirs," Mzee Githaiga reckoned then.

It never happened because after the PC's office referred him to the media and we wrote a story, nobody picked it up.

"I was initially disappointed but over the years came to realise that maybe none of the former president's handlers thought it was important," Githaiga, who is now 72, said of that episode.

Speaking at his deeply-forested homestead on a steep deep toward the Gura river, he reminisces about the missed encounter.

"I was once tasked to take the former vice president through the livestock stand at the Agricultural Society of Kenya Nyeri show and remember his humility and love of the people. Now I feel a sense of loss - of a national hero," Githaiga said in deep thought.

His grief is accentuated when he speaks further of Kibaki though he admits he never got to share a moment with him.

To get Githaiga over it, we asked him about his deeply forested farm.

"I had fallen in love with forestry when I visited Chehe forest in Mathira as a Form Two boy at Nyeri High School. It was my dream career but the department said my body was too frail to survive the rigours of a forestry career."