Anxiety as DNA results for Kakamega ‘twins’ ready

The riddle of the two look-alike girls of Kakamega, Sharon Mathias and Melon Lutenyo, is set to be unravelled amidst the growing anxiety and uneasiness.

According to Ms Rosemary Onyango, the woman who has been living with Melon Lutenyo in Kakamega County, they have received information that the results are ready.

“We have received communication from the doctors in Nairobi to travel and receive the results for the DNA tests. The girls are excited about the news and have travelled to Eldoret town to do shopping before we set off to Nairobi,” said Ms Onyango on Monday.

The two girls’ grabbed headlines for weeks following their resemblance that made many, pending a definitive DNA test to the contrary, conclude they are identical twins.

The identity of the two girls did not only make news within the walls of their country but also across the border.

Having both born on August 1999 in the same hospital, Kakamega County Referral, and raised in different regions, the events that reunited the two girls 19 years later is a classical case of a well-scripted movie intertwining destiny and coincidence.

It is after Sharon, who was raised in Nairobi by Angeline Omina, joined Shikoti Girls Secondary school in Kakamega that the journey of the two meeting began.

For Melon joining Kongoni Secondary School after failing to adapt to a boarding school life marked the journey of meeting her very possible twin sister.

After academic outings, classmates and teachers who met any of them could not understand how their student and classmate belonged to the other school.

Melon Lutenyo, Sharon Mathias and Mevis Imbaya pose for a photo at their Furfural home in Likuyani, Kakamega County. The three teenage girls are alleged to have been separated at birth in Kakamega County Referral Hospital. 18th April 2019. [PHOTO: KEVIN TUNOI]

Melon did not take the news of her resembling someone seriously. She knew she had a twin sister by the name Melvis Imbaya but they were not identical to warrant comparable attention. Then, she downplayed the reports.

But the reports became so persistence each day teacher and classmates mate Sharon. And when she received a picture of Sharon and her teachers it dawned on her that the puzzle was real.

“When the teacher brought the picture to me, she placed it before me and asked me do you know this person? I told her, how can I fail to know myself? The teacher asked again, are you sure this is you?” Melon told KTN on April 18.

“I told him this is not my uniform but it is me. After insisting it was me, the teacher opened up and said the person in the picture was not me but Sharon Mathias from Shikoti Girls. I could not believe it. It dawned on me that I have heard of this confusion before and began searching for answers,” she added.

During the holiday the two girls made efforts to look for each other. After several interactions, a determined and curious Sharon took a journey to Nairobi.

On arrival in Nairobi, Kangemi, the two had an emotional reunion that any long-separated identical twins can have.

When it was clear to both families that their appearance had all hallmarks of resemblance, a DNA test came calling.

But even as the world is waiting to confirm their pre-DNA conclusion, the two families that raised the two girls are in a dilemma as they await the make-or-break news.

For Sharon and Melon, DNA results may not mean much to them since they vowed never to be apart from each other. ?