Picking up the pieces of a shattered life

Daniel Mutuku, a victim of the March grenade attack in Eastleigh, now operates a mkototeni to make a living. [Photo: Machua Koinange/standard]

Nairobi, Kenya: Daniel Mutuku's hand healed amazingly well in the last five months. But the smile on his face cannot mask the pain that he has been going through since he miraculously survived a terrorist bombing in March this year.

Five months ago, Mutuku made Sh20,000 as the manager of Sheraton Hotel in the heart of Eastleigh, Nairobi. After the attack on March 31, Mutuku has been struggling to make ends meet and support his family as a labourer outside the premises of the now renovated building.

He wakes up every morning hoping to get work to move wholesale goods with his mkokoteni or just provide hand labour to merchandise buyers near Second Street.

"I live on handout from friends and the little I make from the little work I get. It has been very difficult," he says. But he can still afford a smile despite his new life stuck in the highway of misery.

Mutuku had just served a customer with chapati and ndengu. The customer was in a rush. Later, he had a brief altercation with the same customer over Sh10 change. Afterwards the customer walked out of the hotel in a huff.

He locked the hotel door from outside and fled. Unbeknown to the patrons, who were following the day's news on TV, the young man had left behind a bag containing an IED (improvised explosive device). Moments later it exploded killing six people and injuring several others. Mutuku's right arm was partially burnt. That was the beginning of his journey downhill.

Despite miraculously surviving the attack, he knew his world had changed for the worse when he was driven to Kenyatta National Hospital. "I spent the night at the hospital and had a bill of Sh4,000. I had no choice but to find money to settle it. We were told that if we did not pay we would not be given any medicine."

He adds: "We told the health workers that we were victims of a terror attack and we had no money. The doctors avoided us; they would leave you in bed without attending to you. If you were a victim and had nobody to help you, you would have died in the hospital. I called several people I knew and we raised the money."

With no health insurance, Mutuku learnt quickly that no help would be coming from the Government. He pooled money from friends and left the hospital the following day.

He recovered quickly and after two weeks he was healed. Then began the next phase of his misery. The hotel owner who had employed him, Clair Wahito, told him that the building would take time to be repaired and she could not employ him any more.

"I realised that my job was gone. But I had to pay bills, put food on the table and support my family that included an eight-year-old girl and two-year-old boy. I started looking for work elsewhere."

Mutuku's wife sells clothes at Muthurwa market, a business he helped her set up. But the income is not enough to sustain the family.

With the renovation of the building taking too long and desperate to support his family, Mutuku went back to the streets.

"I started doing casual labour and running a mkokoteni. I do any work that I find as long as it brings some income. I don't choose work," he says.

Mutuku says life has been difficult. Matters have been made worse by lack of support from the Government and other quarters. "I survive through friends and live from hand to mouth," he says.