FJA 2020 Shortlist
Category: Contribution to Civil Rights
Gloria Aradi (Kenya)
A series of articles
I'm Paying Sh. 20,000 for 58 Years for the Body of my Pre-Term Baby
The Standard Newspaper
March 2, 2020
The original publication is available via the following link:
Jabali, Damaris Makimei’s bundle of joy, was born premature and thrust into Aga Khan Hospital’s Intensive Care Unit. Seven months and Sh19 million later, the poor boy died.
And now, his heartbroken mother will pay the hospital Sh20,000 every month for the next 58 years, to clear an outstanding bill for a child she loved and lost before he lived.
“I can’t get closure, because now I am stuck paying for something I don’t have,” Makimei sobs.
Signs of impending doom started when she was barely six weeks pregnant. She was bleeding heavily, and by the ninth week, her blood pressure had hit the roof. Just before the 25th week, her gynaecologist recommended that she terminate the pregnancy, since her high blood pressure was almost causing her kidneys to shut down.
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Help Me Bury My Mother Who Has Been in Morgue for Two Years
The Standard Newspaper
November 8, 2019
The original publication is available via the following link:
It has been two years of despair and unending mental anguish for Francisca Wanjiru.
Each day, she has to wrestle with the haunting fact that her mother’s body is lying inside a freezer at the Nairobi Women’s Hospital mortuary.
Wanjiru’s story, although not unique, is a tragic one. Since the death of her mother, Stella Wamuyu Mwangi, on November 17, 2017, the hospital has detained the body over an unpaid bill of Sh4,046,341 accumulated during a four-month stay in the facility.
The daughter says they are victims of circumstance. In July 2017, during a strike by health workers, her mother unexpectedly fell sick. At first, Wanjiru and her sister arranged for Wamuyu to be treated in the house because they lacked medical insurance.
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Family Holds Emotional Memorial Service as Body of Son Is Detained at Gertrude's Hospital
The Standard Newspaper
March 12, 2020
The original publication is available via the following link:
A forbidding silence hung unbearably over the few hundred inconsolable mourners gathered at St Stephen’s Church, Gatuikira in Ndenderu, Kiambu County.
Overwhelmed by grief yet resilient, the church held a memorial service for 13-year-old Brian Kimani Njoroge Wednesday morning. It was attended by his schoolmates, friends and family, led by his parents Maryanne Wanjiku and Stephen Njoroge as well as his three younger siblings.
Orange candles shone dimly at the altar as Brian’s schoolmates sang dirges. Brian’s brother Stephen Kinuthia, along with a friend, sang ‘Yesu, Master Wangu’, a song they had recorded during Brian’s better days.
Brian died on February 29, losing a gruelling two-year battle with acute myeloid leukaemia. But his death marked the beginning of another battle — the family’s struggle to get his body from Getrude’s Children’s Hospital in Muthaiga, Nairobi where he died.
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