Doctor: I suffer from ‘a genius-only’ disease

By VINCENT MABATUK AND ROBERT KIPLAGAT

BARINGo: A nominee for the position of chief officer in Baringo County shocked the county parliamentary vetting panel when he told them he suffers from a disease that afflicts only genius people.

Gideon Toromo, who in 2010 shot dead Daniel Karanja, a teacher, with a poisonous arrow and was later declared mentally unsound by a psychiatrist, was being vetted for the position of Chief Officer Health Services.

Dr Toromo left those in attendance in stiches when he claimed that his mental disease only affects geniuses, citing world scholars such as Winston Churchill and Abraham Lincoln as some of the people who had the disease.

“The mental illness is only for geniuses,” he said. The panellists had wanted to know from the nominee about his state of mind given that a report by a psychiatrist in April 13, 2010 had indicated that he suffered from psychiatric disorder (paranoid schizophrenia), which he denied and said he suffered from bipolar disorder type one.

“Gideon is an adult male who is mentally unsound. He suffers from poorly controlled chronic psychiatric disorder (paranoid schizophrenia), a disorder characterised mainly by delusion of persecution and such patients are typically tense, suspicious, hostile or aggressive. They can be a danger to themselves or to others,” read a psychiatric report prepared by Dr JW Njau, dated April 13, 2010.

But the same psychiatrist in 2011 declared Toromo as healed and fit. The case was, however, terminated in 2013 after the family of the deceased teacher agreed to an out of court settlement.

“That after soul searching and critical evaluation of how the incident occurred, we arrived at a consensus that the accused was not in the right state of mind at the material time to know what was happening and therefore, did not intentionally commit the offence,” said Grace Wanjiru Igogo, the widow in a sworn affidavit signed and dated February 5, 2013.

Members of the Committee on Health Service chaired by Assembly Chair on Health Solomon Chemjor and his Deputy Daniel Tuwit had a rough time interrogating the nominee and were forced to end the vetting process within a record.

Toromo admitted to the vetting panel that he shot at four people with poisonous arrows killing one of them but blamed mental sickness after he lacked sleep for two months.

“I had not slept for two months and developed bipolar disorder type one and I shot at four people with arrows and killed one. I was not intending to kill anyone,” Dr Toromo told the panel.