Dung hits the fan in hotel worker’s salary protest

By DANIEL PSIRMOI

An entertaining farce unfolded in Kanduyi Market, along the Eldoret-Malaba Highway near Bungoma town when an angry employee of a popular restaurant poured faeces all over the hotel floor and walls as he protested non-payment of his dues.

The mid-morning incident last Saturday, attracted curious onlookers and nearly brought business along the busy highway to a standstill. Passersby milled the incident as they tried to have a glimpse of the man, a cleaner, who resorted to the bizarre act, to force his high-handed boss to pay up his three-month salary arears.

“I cannot suffer so severely when I have a family depending on me and bills to pay, yet someone doesn’t want to pay my money. Nitapaka ukuta zote za hii hoteli hii kinyesi, pia ifungwe twende wote hasara nisipopewa pesa zangu (I will smear all the walls in this hotel with human waste and have it closed down so that we both incur losses if I am not paid my dues),” threatened the fuming bare-chested middle-aged man. He had paper bag full of human waste precariously dangling in his hand. How a popular businessman who is said to be a landlord and a proprietor of a fleet of vehicles plying several routes had failed to pay his employee puzzled public.

“I will not suffer in silence like my other frustrated colleagues who have not, for months, received a single shilling. I won’t be a coward like them until I receive what is rightfully mine,” shouted the employee, to much applause from the bystanders.

Policemen who were called to the scene to whisk the enraged man away faced his wrath, when he rummaged through the waste and made as if to stir using his hand and threatened to wash them with the nauseating mixture.

Their efforts to arrest the man were further hindered by members of the public, who supported the employee and accused the officers of colluding with the restaurant owner to frustrate employees demanding their dues.

Harsh times

“Arrest this man at your own peril. The Constitution allows people to protest. This is not Uganda. Let him be paid his money. How do you expect him to survive in these harsh economic times?” shouted a man perched atop a boda boda.

Guests who were enjoying their breakfast in the hotel, were held hostage for several hours. The man told Crazy Monday he resorted to such unorthodox protest after his boss started taking him in circles when he demanded to be paid.

Efforts to reach the owner of the restaurant for a comment bore no fruits. He was said to have travelled to Mombasa and his phone went unanswered.