Brutal family killing that horrified entire nation

Mukobero (centre) in jail.

By BEATRICE WAMUYU

The rain had drenched everyhomestead along the narrow village path that Sunday night. A family sat together for supper, their faces only illuminated by the jaundiced flames from a paraffin tin lamp.

Later, they went to sleep in their brick-walled house. Three boys retired to their hut, adjacent to the main house.

In the middle of the night, the man of the house, who was later identified as Jamin Mukobero, crept from his bed and picked up a panga. What followed would remain Kenya’s ugliest incident of violence at home, a petrifying moment of rage.

Mukobero hacked his wife Susan to death - she was expecting a child.

He rushed to the hut he had built for his sons — Evans, Alusiola and Oscar — and killed them too. With blood on his hands and raindrops streaming down his body, he woke up the other family members, saying his wife was unwell and needed to be taken to hospital. He killed four of them, bringing the number of the dead to nine.

His daughter, Fanice, who had slept in her aunt’s house after supper, was also slain. She was 17.

Mukobero’s brother, Inishow Mboya, survived by the skin of his teeth.

“I cannot explain what happened to my brother. He was such a kind man,” Mboya said later, detailing how he ran and hid in a maize plantation.

The following morning, April 30, 2001, the birds did not chirp. The rising sun could not lift the gloom that descended on Shibuye village, Kakamega.

What had driven this man, described by villagers as calm and kind, to kill the people he loved? At 43-years of age, Mukobero was struggling to provide for his family. He said as a mason, he could not make enough money to put bread on the table.

“My jobless wife and children had nothing to eat,” he said, added a chilling disclaimer: “I’m not satisfied with the death of my family members. I will only be satisfied when I have taken my whole life and that of the remaining ones.”

But there was a weird twist to the macabre tale.

Forty-years earlier, an uncle had killed his wife and their three children. Mukobero’s mother, Lobai Matilani, said she believed the family was haunted because they did not perform cleansing rituals prescribed by Luhya traditions.

According to some media reports, the uncle beheaded all his children, after taking their bodies to Matilani. He first woke up his mother, telling the same story that his wife was unwell. He then ordered her to kneel down at the doorway of her hut, instructing her to offer prayers and chant dirges.

He then cut off their heads.

Those who survived the attack but had serious injuries were taken to St Elizabeth Mission Hospital, Mukumu.

Family feud

Witnesses gave varying reasons for the murders. Some said Mukobero had issued a threat during his brother’s wedding because the bridegroom had some differences with his own wife. He was bitter because another sibling, Gideon Ingasa went ahead to bless the couple while he had repeatedly told him not to.

Mukobero also later changed his story, saying the killings were prompted by a family feud over land.

It was Mboya who described the scene that unfolded as his brother went on a rampage in the darkness.

Mboya and another relative, Bahati had been chased away by Mukobero who had intended to kill them too. He said he was woken up by his mother’s screams.

“When I came out, I saw him walking with Hannah. As I stood wondering where the commotion was, I saw him slash Hannah three times. She fell down, writhing in pain”, said Mboya. He tried to stop Mukobero but he waved the panga at him, ready to kill.

“I ran down the valley towards a stream. I was too slow for him but when he was about to catch up, he slipped and fell. I could barely see, but I kept running. I spent the night in a maize plantation.”

Mukobero later apologised for his actions, saying he was provoked by his brother. “My brother was trying to snatch our family land and when I approached him on Sunday to settle the matter, he threatened to deal with me,” he said.

“I am now a very worried man and do not know what will happen to me when I leave hospital. I deeply regret killing my family members in such a brutal manner, but it was because my brother provoked me over our family land.”

After undergoing trial, he was jailed at the president’s pleasure and is cooling his heels at Kodiaga Maximum Security Prison, Kisumu.