I hit him hard until gun fell, says woman who wrestled gangster

Caroline Nafula. She held on to the attacker fiercely, pressing on his stomach, so he could not make a move. [Martin Ndiema, Standard]

It was later established that the firearm, serial number 95070344, was violently stolen from a Kenya Prisons officer guarding a patient under arrest within the Kitale Level Four Hospital on April 18 this year.

Nafula says her husband praised her for the great courage she exhibited, saying she is a worthy wife.

Born and brought up by a single parent in Bikeke village, Kiminini sub-county, Nafula learnt early in life that she had to have strong determination to make it in life.

She schooled at Bikeke primary before proceeding to Bikeke mixed secondary school, which had just opened its doors, but it was a difficult task for her parent to pay school fees. As fate would have it, Nafula, who was the only girl in a family of four children, learnt how to endure difficulties in life.

"My brothers encouraged me to be strong and did not give me room to be lazy as their only sister. At times, we would fight hard and only for them to give up," she says.

At school, she was gifted with the art of poetry and athletics and participated in clubs, but stopped when she joined secondary school due to fewer activities in her school.

After secondary school, Nafula started working as an attendant at a community telephone booth in Kitale town in 2003 and would walk 10 kilometres to and from work.

"I would trek daily to save Sh100 I was paid as my day's wage and Sh20 meant for lunch," she says.

Nafula, who later volunteered as a behaviour change champion, says she was sacked in 2013, barely five years on, after falling pregnant.

Courtesy of a donor who spotted her potential while working for the Kitale Aids Program under the Catholic diocese of Kitale, Nafula pursued a diploma course in Human Resource Management.

She had wished to be a police officer and attempted recruitment several times but was unlucky. She later opened a retail shop in Kitale after failing to get formal employment.

Now a heroine in her own right, Nafula says her husband has finally accepted the prayer meetings she has been attending and has given her a green light to keep attending them.