Get my wife out of my land before I kill someone, old man tells Kenyan government

Esther Wairimu in the dock [Photo/PKEMOI NG'ENOH/Standard]

An old man who is embroiled in a land dispute with his wife in Nairobi’s Maili-Saba slum has warned that someone will die.

Francis Irungu Mwangi now wants the government to kick out Agnes Njeri Muigai, claiming she is the source of his misery and multiple illnesses. He alleges that if the wrangles persist, one of them will have to die for peace to prevail. The couple has not known peace for the eight years they have fought over the 30 by 60 feet piece of land.

The 70-year-old man says efforts by elders, sub-chief and chief to reconcile them have hit a snag. His latest bid to obtain a court order compelling the wife to move from the plot also failed.

Mwangi says he suffers from diabetes, hypertension, arthritis and high cholesterol, resulting from his stressful marriage to Njeri whom he met in 1990 after divorcing his first wife, Mary Ruguru over alleged religious differences. He claims Njeri has ganged up with her daughters from a previous marriage to kick him out of the land, which he acquired while still working as a crane operator at a construction company. Though the family lives on the same disputed plot, Mwangi resides in a separate room where he cooks for himself

Njeri admitted that they lead separate lives but insists that it is her husband who left their matrimonial bed.

“Nobody chased him, he is the one who left. There was nothing I could do. I am a saved person. The truth will come to pass one day,” she said.