Murang’a grandmother’s cry: A gang burned my son alive and forced me and his children to lie on his ashes

Ms Sasida Njeri, 75, had just finished dinner at around 9pm on July 12, 2024 and was on her knees praying before she could retire to bed when screams and curses in her compound shattered her world.

Despite being disabled and walking with the aid of a cane, the grandmother ventured out and was met with a commotion of a crowd outside her son’s home.

“Although it was already dark, by the light of the torches I identified the five men standing in front of my son’s house as my neighbours and swore they were there to deal out death. My son, Martin Kamau, 46, had been dragged from his home and beaten and accused of being a cattle thief. The crowd tried to drag him out of the compound, saying they had to kill him,” he says.

Ms Njeri says she pleaded with the five men, calling them by name, to abandon their violent mission.

“I immediately regretted my words because one of the men slapped me hard on my left cheek. I fell down and as I struggled to get up I saw another of my sons, John Mwangi, 38, brandishing a machete and threatening to kill anyone who dared attack his mother and anyone who did not leave our compound immediately. In the ensuing scuffle, I heard one of the attackers shout that his head had been cut off as he ran away,” she said. Nation.Africa in his home village of Muchungucha, Kiharu Constituency, Murang’a County.

Ms Njeri said it was only when the pain from the blow to her head subsided that she found tears.

“Tears were streaming down my face non-stop. I missed my husband, Peter Githathai, who died in 2016. If he had been in the compound, I am sure the attackers would have thought twice before attacking us. I wish we had died together,” she says.

She says she called her two sons and her six children, ages 11 to 14, who had also woken up, for an impromptu prayer meeting that ended around midnight.

“In these prayers I asked God to protect us from evil and, if my sons had gone astray, to correct them so that they would be safe. The two sons had sworn to the living God that they were not thieves… But since I had no proof whether they were thieves or not, I left their judgment in the hands of the living God,” he says.

She says Kamau dropped out of third grade and, after helping with household farming activities, eventually took up small-scale farming, “and I knew that was his occupation because even now when he’s already dead and buried, I can show him a plot where he has ripe green beans ready for market.”

As for Mwangi, he said he had dropped out of sixth grade and had started life as a casual labourer in the village, occasionally venturing into the cities to look for work on construction sites. Coincidentally, both had been abandoned by their wives.

Saturday passed without incident and Ms Njeri was happy that peace had returned to the village.

“But I was wrong… On Sunday morning, at about 10am, as I was about to go to church, the same five men who had attacked us on Friday night appeared. They were armed with sticks and whips, and one of them was carrying a jerry can full of what I later discovered was petrol,” he said.

She says the gang forced their way into Mr Kamau’s home, dragged him into an open courtyard of the compound and beat him severely, this time saying they had permission from the authorities to kill him because he was a thief.

“I was warned that if I tried to intervene, I would be killed… It was my son who, in his distress, raised his left hand and waved at me, shaking his blood-soaked head to warn me to stay away… He then raised his left hand again and waved goodbye to me and his three children,” she said.

Ms Njeri said she could not bear to see the barbaric violence inflicted on her son and lunged at him.

“While I was crying, my son whispered to me: Mom, blame it on our poverty… I am not a thief. I am not dying for anything, except that we are defenseless,” she said. Nation.Africa.

She said she was grabbed by the legs, dragged away from her son and moments later her son’s body exploded in a rolling ball of fire as he writhed in pain after being doused in gasoline and set alight.

“They proceeded to burn down three houses in my compound. The attackers ordered me and Kamau’s three sons to stand guard while he burned to ashes. When the fire died down, leaving charred remains, the gang, which had now grown to about 11 men, ordered us to lie down on the ashes so that they could set us alight. I told them I was ready to die because after 75 years of life, having given birth to nine children, I had had my share of life… I told them to spare the three children,” she said.

It took the intervention of elderly neighbors watching from a distance to stop the planned lynching of the grandmother and her grandchildren.

Police arrived around 4 p.m. and took Kamau’s remains to the morgue after crime scene investigators processed the premises and collected evidence.

In what Murang’a Senator Joe Nyutu later described as “an act of raw barbarism and lawlessness”, County Commissioner Joshua Nkanatha said: “We cannot allow such an act to go unpunished.”

Mr Nkanatha said the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) was actively investigating the case with the aim of “identifying all those involved in this act of murder”.

The post-mortem report filed at the Murang’a County morgue said “the victim died from severe burns… with indications that he suffered fractures to his legs and hands prior to being burnt.”

The report states that “the injuries caused by the use of blunt objects were not life-threatening, but the injuries caused by the fire began while he was alive: he was burned alive.”

Mr Nkanatha added: “We have already recorded statements from key eyewitnesses, including Ms Njeri, and we are confident that justice will be done.”

The President of the Murang’a Chapter of the Law Society of Kenya, Mr Alex Ndegwa, said: “This is a clear testimony of a village where the rule of law has collapsed and the security machinery is suspiciously non-existent if such an incident could be planned three days in advance and executed without any interference from law enforcement agents.”

“Where systems of government have collapsed, lawlessness thrives and the best redemption that security agents can offer is to ensure that the perpetrators of this unfortunate murder are arrested and punished,” he said.

After burying Mr. Kamau on 19 July 2024, the family found a note written in Gikuyu on the grave on the morning of 20 July 2024.

The note, written in pencil on a scrap of paper, warned: “This death is not enough, we will come back and kill the rest of your family because they are full of thieves… remember to also present Mwangi, whom you are hiding from us even after he attacked and injured one of us with a panga.”

Ms Njeri says she is living the worst moment of her life. “I am now worried that whoever wrote the note will carry out the threat.