SAD TALE
It is close to eight years since the country was hit by skirmishes after the 2007/2008 elections that were hit by controversy and some Kenyans like Manasseh Wagunda Ouma are still reeling in shock of what hit them.
Manasseh is now completely blind and lives by the mercy of well-wishers and good Samaritans who he says sometimes come to see him in days, sometimes weeks.
We heard of his plight and decided to pay him a visit at his make-shift home at Nyamome in Suna West sub-county to get to know what befell him.
Manasseh, as he keeps referring to himself throughout our conversation with him was once a normal man with his full
sight till the eve of 2008.
Until December 31, 2007 Manasseh lived with his family in Kikuyu but was forced to part with his wife so as to save them.
“Riots broke out and in no time gangs started pursuing those of us who were deemed foreigners but their focus was more on men, “Manasseh narrated.
He however recalls how the previous day, December 29, 2007 he was caught up in a fierce fight between the police and a rowdy mob who were causing mayhem.
Manasseh says on the very day, he was on board matatu plying route 105 and thereafter change to a route 130 when he started developing blindness.
As they were alighting from the matatu to look for a safe place away from the running battles between the police and unruly gangs, the unfortunate happened.
A hurled teargas canister fell at his feet exploding and the next thing Manasseh remembers was being surrounded by police officers who released him to go to his home in Zambezi when his conditions stabilised.
It was after this that his eyes started producing tears uncontrollably but, he says, he ignored it not knowing the danger that awaited him; that he was going to be blind.
His condition then turned for worse when as he was fleeing from a mob that was baying for his blood.
“I beat them in speed, I guess because of me being a sports man, but in the process tripped and fell on some thorny tree bruising my eye,” Manasseh narrates as he moves his hands over the now healed scars over his eyelid.
At this point Manasseh digresses to narrate to us his brief stay at Gor Mahia football club in the late 1980’s.
The former winger vividly recalls an accident that they were involved at Lower Kabete around Kabete Technical Training Institute after they had visited one Nyangi Odembo who had been involved in an accident earlier.
Manasseh boasts to us of winning the Mandela cup as well as the Moi Golden cup where they beat AFC leopards 2-0 in Khartoum.
He however confesses that the accident they were involved gave him an injury making him quit Gor Mahia and head to Kisumu to train Lake blue stars in Dunga Kisumu.
He stayed in Kisumu for few years before he went back to Nairobi to work with a Christian NGO.
“I worked for the NGO till 2007 when the skirmishes erupted and we part ways. The NGO also moved back to the US,” Manasseh said.
Back to the post election violence, Manasseh stayed in the bush where he had sought refuge, along the Nakuru – Nairobi where he relied on leaves from some tree, (it’s called Ochuoga in his native luo) and due from grass and leaves for water for 10 days.
“I found refuge after 10 day and went to one of my brother’s house in Nairobi who on noticing my deteriorating eye problem who decided to send me to our rural home in Rabuo in Awendo,” he narrated.
The once sole breadwinner of his family has from around February 2008 been abandoned by his family and friends.
According to Manasseh, he was picked up by a good Samaritan who built him a makeshift house on her land but the woman had resorted to sell the land to foot the bill of his ailing husband.
“I was picked up by a group of Christians who were moving around praying in homes in the neighbourhood where I was abandoned and a house was put up for me,” Manasseh recalled.
Manasseh was at the brink of death when he was rescued because his health had deteriorated as no one attended to him and his only hopes of getting food was when the group of ‘Prayer Warriors’ came by.
With the land that he was living in now being sold, Manasseh fears that he will go back to his previous deplorable and miserable life.
“I don’t want to go to my parents place as the land they have cannot house all of us, as the eldest son I bought them the land but I have to look for other alternatives,” he said.
The God fearing lover of music plays some tune on his guitar that he doesn’t let go throughout our conversation and says that though he registered as an Internally Displaced Person (IDP), he has not gotten any help from the government.
When his younger brother put him on a bus to their home in Awendo, Manasseh says he registered with his area chief at Rabuor Chiefs camp but nothing has been forthcoming.
Manasseh does not also get the government stipend for persons with disability.
Manasseh who has completed training in vocational training centre and has a certificate in general agriculture is seeking the help of county government officials to help him secure relevant employment as he was not willing to go to the streets begging.
The former Gor mahia player says he misses his children who, he believes are under the care of a Christian group he worked with while was still in Nairobi.
