Worker’s close shave with deadly python

Mr Ben Nyaumbe who fought with a 13-foot python. Photo/ Daniel Nyassy

A lawyer who rescued his farm worker from a constricting python says he is still baffled at how his employee survived the attack.

Mr Tukero ole Kina said that the snake was big and spectacular. He confirmed that his worker, Mr Ben Nyaumbe, is the one who called him on his mobile phone.

In fact, Mr Nyaumbe, was not bitten by the snake because pythons do not bite —they constrict and swallow their prey.
He said the victim was treated for pains he sustained when he fell off the tree. “We took him to hospital where he was given some pain-killers,” Mr Kina said.

The lawyer said that when Mr Nyaumbe called saying that he had been attacked by a snake, he called the Malindi police chief who told him to get assistance from police officers who were manning a roadblock three kilometres from the farm on the Malindi-Lamu Road.

“I rushed to the roadblock and managed to get two officers who accompanied me to the farm,” he said. Mr Kina said that when they got to the farm, they called for Mr Nyaumbe only to hear him respond from a thicket near the cowshed.

Speaking to the Daily Nation a day after the story was published, Mr Kina said that they took the deadly reptile to the Falconry of Kenya in Malindi and left it there. But it was nowhere to be seen the following day.

Also baffled by the disappearance of the snake is Malindi OCPD Peter Kattam, who confirmed that his officers escorted the snake to the farm.

“How the snake vanished is very strange, but we’ll not relent in the search because it could harm other people and even animals,” he said.