Long time ago, something quite strange happened in my home
area. It was many years ago, a time when Kenyans preferred actual food to teargas,
people lived in Mukuru kwa Njenga instead of Mukuru Kwa Zuckerberg (read facebook)and the word
sponsor actually meant a good Samaritan who was paying for your school fees instead
of some octogenarian who gave you money for your honey (I hear these days they
are called `blessers')......by the way when you hear your girl proclaiming that she's blessed,dude,be very suspicious.
Now, the actual happenings of what I am going to narrate were told to me by a third party who had
witnessed them all like findyo like ndrama.I might have added a
word or two to the original version but, hey,even Kaligraph Jones did Ojuelegba refix and we are all cool
with it.
It all started with the late Hon. Njega Karume making an
impromptu visit to the area. At that time visiting Ukambani while carrying some relief food
with you was thought quite fashionable by the politicians. So
the late Mheshimiwa not wanting to look like a mtiaji brought lots of food with him.
Hon.Karume with the Local M.P addressed the people and then
took off leaving the local administration in charge of distributing the food.
People were divided into their respective sub-locations with their sub chiefs
in charge.
One sub chief saw it prudent to first ‘remove’ a speech
before he gave food to his people. He stood on a sack of maize so that his
people could hear as well see him as he oozed wisdom and words of nation
building.
Unfortunately, some guy who was not a huge fan of speeches
or sub chiefs for that matter got quite impatient. He pulled the sack which the
sub chief stood on. One sad thing about gravity is that it is no respector of titles.
It D(oesn’t)GAF if you lead an entire
sublocation,so the administrator came tumbling down like a plane shot from the
sky by an enemy drone.
Before the other sub chiefs could scream ‘akiangai!’, it
became full chaos. What was initially a normal relief food distribution
exercise quickly turned into an exhibition of close combat tactics. Karate chops,
weave-pulling, kicks to the groin, Kidero slaps and ’‘Makueni punches were all on full display.
Makueni punches (
ngumi sya Makueni) was a term which was used to describe some kind of punches which at that time were
popular in the lower
Makueni County. The first step in executing
these punches in a fight involved dashing into the opposite direction. Your opponent at
first would think that you were running away only for him to discover too late
that it was just a maneuver to add more velocity and sting to the forthcoming blow.
Another thing which your opponent discovered too late was that he should have
bought a new set of teeth before that fight.
Back to the relief food chaos.
The intensity of the slaps that were being thrown around
made you question the intentions of your assailant:" does this guy want to render me comatose? Why is this lady attempting to perform some illegal craniotomy
on me without my informed consent?" I particularly remember being told the
story of one bespectacled fellow who on grabbing a sack of maize dashed for the
fence only to be stopped dead on his tracks with smack by a Popeye -like arm . Legend has it that he got hit so hard across the face that his glasses almost
shrunk into contact lenses.
Another unfortunate incidence that I can recall of involved an
old man.The mzee had picked a few Jerri cans of corn oil and was strolling
leisurely when he got swept off his feet and the Jerri cans taken while he was
still in flight. By the time he landed and tried to look up to see whose manner less son was that, neither the oil nor his assailant were in sight.
Tragedy struck in broad daylight when some lady decided to
use the lower part of her skirt to ferry some
ndegus back to her handbag. Poor
life decision. Everyone was upon her like white on rice and within seconds her
skirt was floating high in the air like a blade of grass. It’s alleged that the
perpetrators of this heinous act were some
Fisiotherapy graduates who had been earlier
heard swearing that
‘Leo tunadandia kama mathree chopper.'
Another person who made a bad life decision on that day was
the chief. Seeing that his assistants had failed to control the rowdy crowd, he
decided to do it himself. He charged into the crowd, stick in hand. The
stick broke after he struck two or three people. Some patriotic citizen present then decided to reward the chief’s heroic efforts by emptying a whole packet of milk
powder on his head.
It was not until all food had been looted or mixed with soil
that normalcy returned. People then did the walk of shame back to their homes.
Anyway, this is what happens when you bring relief food to people who really don’t
need it.
