Former student leader died as he lived, violently

A former city campus student leader was brutally murdered, following a scuffle at an off-campus joint where comrades at the institution usually seek cheap food and liquor.

The scuffle was reportedly about ownership of the land upon which the joint sits and the kiosks therein. The former student's leader had earlier alleged that "Mungiki" wielding "guns and pangas" were plotting to grab the place. He was shot when he allegedly led a group of people to reclaim the land from these "Mungiki."

I have seen a lot of things written about this comrade online and I can't help but shake my head in utter disbelief. So I decided to write mine because, you know, freedom of speech et al.

Before I even go any further with this tribute, I want to state here categorically (been long since anyone used that word, I feel like a school principal) that nobody - absolutely nobody - deserves to go out the way he did. That was death in such a brutally cold manner that I wouldn't wish on any of my worst enemies.

But, see here's the thing, lyrics from a song by Rock City kept ringing in my head when I heard of the former Kilimani Ward MCA aspirant's death: "Live by the gun, die by the gun.. you kind of had it coming."

Listen, I am neither glorifying death here nor saying "good riddance" to whatever happened to him. I am not that person. What I am saying, however, is that I refuse to sing praises to a downright evil person as society wants us to just because they're dead. That I will not do.

I write this on an evening after visiting the crime scene. I spoke to those Mama Mbogas and listened as they narrated to me the horrors they went through under the rogue student leader. That he would show up with his cohorts and they would demand money from the traders for security else they would beat them to a pulp. They seemed relieved, following that death. Their faces said it all.

Here's what I do know, however, about three or so years ago my brother was running for student leadership at the institution. This one day, when he had no money at all, he ran into the rogue leader and he told him: "If you're not going to give me any money then I'm going to sell this suit you're wearing to get some."

And it was all funny until he actually did it; he forcefully stripped my brother down to his boxers - in public - and walked away with his suit, leaving him half naked in front of over 30 people.

The truth of the matter is the leader was an unbelievably evil man who lived his life on the brink of unparalleled violence. He caused so much pain to so many fellow comrades that even I believe he will not find any peace in his afterlife.