My encounter with the man who shot Dedan Kimathi Updated Sunday, October 20th 2013 I first met Ndirangu Mau one afternoon in late May 1985 in Kongaini village, about ten kilometers from Nyeri town. I was then a high school correspondent working for a local newspaper and looking for my first big story. Ndirangu, then 79, was a frail old man trapped behind a mask of pain, his faced wrinkled and aged with ordeal. He was like any ordinary elderly man in the sunset years of his life, probably waiting for a glowing epitaph to illustrious life’s journey. But Ndirangu was no was ordinary old man. He was the man who on October 21, 1956 shot freedom fighter Dedan Kimathi and his life changed forever. For close to 29 years he had remained silent, living off his years under a cloud of resentment and shame that had also been transferred to his children. He had been shunned and pilloried by local villagers for shooting the man who held a special place in Kenya’s history. His children had been treated as outcasts in school and his family had lived on a small piece of land under a cloud of suspicion and shame. His existence had been tipped to me by Joe Kimathi, (now Al Amin Kimathi, chairman at Muslim Human Rights Forum - Muhuri) then a journalist based in Nyeri. Kimathi had intimated after a long search that the man was actually alive. Would I be interested in telling his story?
Posted on: Sun, 20 Oct 2013 10:38:06 +0000
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