Ahmed Darwesh’s widow recounts former newscaster’s last days

It has not been a smooth ride for Ms Hawa Hussein Jamadar, the widow of former newscaster Ahmed Darwesh. As she revealed during an interview with Nairobi News, Ms. Hawa has suffered a series of misfortunes since her husband’s death, the latest being a robbery incident on Saturday night. Ms. Hawa lost property estimated at Ksh.3 million on the fateful night.

The gangsters made way with all manner of items ranging from phones, carpets, home appliances, sandals and many others.  The widow also received several slaps of a machete blade as the robbers sought to milk information out of her. Her biggest relief though is that neither her nor her two daughters were raped, something she says can only be Allah’s answer to her prayers.

Since the death of her late husband on December 15, 2015, the widow has been involved in a terrible accident and was forced to move from their former home in South B as it was too expensive and moved to Kitengela six months ago.

It was just when she was settling in Kitengela that the fateful incident happened. Ms. Hawa also admitted that it has not been easy raising three children single-handedly. Opening up to Nairobi News for the first time ever, the widow revealed that Ahmed had been given six months to live but lived exactly 8 months and 13 days after the prediction.

“As we had gone to India, we were told he had six months to live. We didn’t tell anybody; we kept quiet. He came and he really changed. He really reformed, but he was a bit stressed-up. He stayed exactly eight months and thirteen days then died,” she told Nairobi News.

“He had diabetes and all his kidneys had failed. The heart also had a problem,” she added. “Not many people knew this; we kept it to ourselves. Some of his friends didn’t even know he was diabetic.”

The widow who has two Master’s degree to her name runs two hotels and a shop to keep her family going.