Where the dead are not allowed to rest in peace

Grave diggers carry the casket bearing Juliet Gitahi’s body following a family row over dowry. [PHOTOS: MOSE SAMMY/ STANDARD]

By MURIMI MWANGI

Nyeri, Kenya: What’s the big deal about burying a relative on a piece of land?

For some people in Nyeri, it is all about culture, religion and money. And in recent cases land rows have led to exhumation of bodies.

At the Land and Environment Court in Nyeri town, names of the departed keep popping up during the hearing of land succession disputes.

This is an indication of how the dead continue to influence the living long after they are gone.

The High Court in Nyeri has in recent months received applications for exhumation of bodies.

The irony is that even though the applicants often cite Kikuyu traditions, elders say it is taboo for the community to casually rub shoulders with the dead.

The applicants argue that the burials were irregularly conducted while others seek exhumation of kin in bitter battles over wealth.

The demands have been bizarre, including a man being asked to pay dowry for his dead wife before he could be allowed to bury the body! Four cases have led to exhumations in the last four months.

In January, one case baffled residents of Kariki village in Othaya, Nyeri County. An evangelical pastor exhumed the body of Esther Wambui two months after she was buried over a land dispute.

Curse

The family alleged that Wambui had requested to be buried on the disputed land — next to her mother’s grave — and warned that failure to grant her wish a curse would befall the family.

However, there was an ownership dispute over the land pitting the family against the pastor, who claimed to have bought it from Wambui’s brother.

Afraid of the said curse, the deceased’s husband of 41 years, Peter Njagi woke up in the wee hours and secretly buried the body on the land before he left for Nairobi.

But no sooner had he washed his hands of the said curse, Pastor John Kihara of  Chinga Deliverance Church moved to court and sought orders to exhume the body.

Nyeri High Court judge, Justice James Wakiaga granted Kihara’s prayers. During the exhumation, Wambui’s family warned the pastor of dire consequences for disturbing their mother.

The deceased’s youngest daughter Lilian Nyambura warned the pastor that they would not touch the coffin.

And as if the gods were passing a message, the ropes used to retrieve the coffin from the grave broke three times. Every time that happened, the family members present would clap and make derogatory utterances against the pastor.

But after the body was successfully exhumed and ferried to the mortuary the pastor said: “I am a man of God and I believe that I cannot be affected by a curse for doing what is within the law.”

Three months later Wambui’s body is still lying at a Mukurwe-ini mortuary as no family member is willing to collect it for burial.

Asked about the issue, Nyambura told The Standard on Saturday that she will only support the burial if the mother’s remains are interred on the disputed land.

“The body would rather remain at the mortuary for eternity but we won’t pursue the curse mum warned us about when she was alive. We did what she wanted and our conscience is clear,” she said.  

Nderitu Wambugu, 81, a Mau Mau veteran and strict adherent of the Kikuyu customs, warned that rubbing shoulders with the dead has serious consequences. Before the influence of Western culture, the Kikuyu never used to bury their dead.

“That is why bodies would be thrown into the bushes away from the villages. Nobody would dare touch corpses and left that to hyenas to devour,” recounted Wambugu.

Greed for wealth

He added: “Even after our people started burying their dead, if by perchance a body were exhumed, a banana stem would have to be planted on the spot.”

He, however, blamed recent exhumations on competition for land due to a growing population and greed for wealth.

In January, the remote Kwa-Joseph Village in Tetu, Nyeri County, hit the headlines, following exhumation of a  body of a woman who died in the USA.

Nyeri Law Courts granted the orders over irregular burial of the woman. Unpaid dowry was at the centre of the controversy.

Juliet Gitahi, 60, died while undergoing treatment at a Virginia hospital in the US. But as soon as her body arrived in the country, dowry wrangles ensued.

The in-laws demanded that Michael Gitahi pay Sh1 million dowry before he could bury his wife at their matrimonial home in Murang’a.

Interestingly the deceased’s brother John Kaguo secretly buried the body in the wee hours at their Nyeri home, after allegedly receiving news that Mr Gitahi had moved to court to reclaim his wife’s body.

Nyeri Resident Magistrate Vincent Nyakundi issued orders for the exhumation, one day after the burial.

Nyeri lawyer Kebuka Wachira opines that the increase in court cases touching on the dead is motivated by commercial interests that have in the recent past ignored dictates of culture.

Some relatives were taking advantage of cases where the deceased did not leave a will.

He, however, noted that the law recognises oral wills relating to place and how a burial should be undertaken. “You can write a will even on an eggshell. The law is clear that an oral will expressed two months before one’s death and in the presence of two witnesses is enforceable by a court of law,” said Mr Wachira.

Lawyer Wahome Gikonyo, says that although funerals are close to the hearts of most people, some of the disputes on place and manner of burial can be resolved amicably without necessarily moving to court.

“Not all such complainants raise issues of violation of human rights. Some of them move to court on personal ego bordering on greed,” said Mr Wahome.

The four Nyeri Law Courts handle even up to 800 cases on one day, most of them being civil, succession and land cases.

But with strict adherence to litigation as a means of dispute resolution — including the somewhat trivial ones — the workload of the land’s judges is expanding by the day.