Tearful joy after tracing childhood Good Samaritan

When the British colonial governor, Sir Evelyn Baring declared a state of emergency in Kenya to counter the Mau Mau movement in 1952, one-year-old Monicah Wanjiku was left crying next to the family’s ikumbi (grain store).

She had been under the watchful eye of her father, King’ori wa Muchemi, who was putting up the family granary when the British soldiers stormed the sleepy villages of Burnt Forest in Uasin Gishu County and ruthlessly rounded up King’ori and other men in his village. They were ordered to board the waiting military trucks and driven off to various detention camps.

DETENTION CAMPS

In the meantime, little Wanjiku, her mother Beatrice Wangeci King’ori, and the rest of the women and children were ordered to board “high-heeled” lorries for repatriation to “their ancestral homes” in Central Kenya. They had been living in Burnt Forest after British settlers evicted the indigenous people from their homes to pave the way for huge tracts of lands to be occupied by the White settlers when Kenya became a colony in 1920.

Sir Baring issued orders to destabilise the fast-growing Mau Mau movement, whose foot soldiers were ready to die, rather than see their land and freedom taken away. The movement was waging war against the British to reclaim their land and their freedom, which had been snatched from them. To the Mau Mau’s advantage, strong African men with Second World War combat skills were infusing the tactics into the movement. Seeing them as a threat, the colonialists decided to capture all the strong African men and put them in various detention camps.

The repatriation would take years, so Wanjiku, her mother and the rest of the women and children first camped in Nakuru before being relocated to Nyeri. Wanjiku’s grandfather — Wangai wa Wahome — lived in Nyeri before being recruited for the Second World War. In such circumstances, it became hard to trace the family tree.

To make matters worse, the land that belonged to her grandfather’s clan in Hubu-ini village in today’s Nyeri County, had been confiscated by colonial government. It was within 10 miles’ radius that was prohibited for settlement. Being too close to the forest, it was considered a possible Mau Mau hideout.

Recalls Wanjiku almost 60 years later: “My mother and I arrived at a tiny village nicknamed ‘Kapenguria’ sitting about two 200 metres from Wangari Maathai’s native home, currently in Ihithe Sub-location, Tetu Sub-County, north of Nyeri Town. We were meant to be handed over to my grandfather’s clan. However, another problem arose. Nobody could trace our roots since nobody seemed to recognise my father as he was born in Uasin Gishu County,” Wanjiku narrates.

Wanjiku and her mother Wangeci arrived at Kapenguria village at the height of the emergency. It was evening and they were hungry and exhausted. They could hardly figure out where to begin. Leaving fertile farmland in Burnt Forest, cattle, sheep, goats and granaries full of cereals and other foodstuff, they found themselves staring at death from starvation.

As the name suggests, Kapenguria village was reminiscent of the Kapenguria prison, where Jomo Kenyatta and five other freedom fighters were detained during the independence struggle. Save for the small hut the community built for them at the colonial reserve village, life was beginning to be miserable for them.

“People were living in small controlled villages closely watched by colonial guards. They had little freedom and hardly cultivated enough food, so most children were malnourished,” Wanjiku recalls.

Being independent-minded her mother Wangeci decided to venture out and look for kibarua (casual labour) within the farmlands. She landed at the home of Mzee Haron Kibuka wa Kihuni. After listening to her plight, Mzee Kibuka could vaguely remember their clan. Filled with kindness characteristic of that time, he urged his wife Loise Wamaitha Kibuka to offer Wangeci a generous share of maize, beans and ngwaci (sweet potatoes) to last them several days.

Mzee Kibuka, who has since died, and his wife, Loise, later decided to offer Wangeci some land to cultivate, even as she continued doing causal work.

“We grew much more than we could consume such that we even sold the surplus at the local Mukarara market. The couple was so generous to us, something that haunts me, urging me to do good to others,” Wanjiku says.

By 1958, the state of emergency had been lifted and Wanjiku’s father released from Lamu detention camp, where many detainees died from poisonous scorpion stings. In 1961, Wanjiku’s family returned to Burnt Forest and started attending school.

For many years, Wangeci, who died in 2016, kept telling her daughter, Wanjiku, that she would one day return to Nyeri as she felt indebted to the Kibukas for helping them, and even giving them land to cultivate.

NOSTALGIA

“After making the statement, mum would pause and remark, ‘tondu ni magiririe tukue’ (because they prevented us from dying),” Wanjiku recalled recently, after tracing Mama Loise Kibuka, 95, who lives with her son Dr Dan Gikonyo in Nairobi, 58 years later.

It would not have been easy for Wanjiku to meet Mama Loise without Dr Gikonyo’s cousin Ann Waruguru Kariuki connecting them. Waruguru met Wanjiku, 68, at her grocery shop in Thika town.

“As we chatted, she told me that she was from Nyeri County. I told her that I had a childhood Good Samaritan whom I would want to meet. When I described to her the name and place, she was astonished. ‘That is my aunt’, Waruguru told me”.

Wanjiku later received a call from Dr Gikonyo. They planned and met in Thika Town where they shared some nostalgic memories as they arranged for the two families’ meeting.

The emotional reunion of Mama Kibuka and Wanjiku was clearly expressed when the two met recently. Wanjiku, who is married to David Muiru Kibinge, lives in Thika.

They have six children and several grandchildren, some of who accompanied her during the memorable visit.

Commenting on the reunion, Dr Gikonyo, co-founder and director of the Karen Hospital said: “A reunion with such a happy ending is rare. It challenges one to learn to do good to someone in need, as your good deeds will follow you.”

Mama Loise described the reunion as a miracle. To be God’s friends, the genial nonagenarian noted, we should indiscriminately help those in need. God, in return, will bless us.  Wanjiku replied that she felt relieved after fulfilling her departed mother’s desire of tracing their benefactors.

“I always felt obliged to make her wish come true, but I didn’t know where to get the family. I’m sure she is smiling down on all of us,” an elated Wanjiku said.