Agnes Wangui, the porridge hawker who won MP’s heart

Agnes Wangui Wambiri, the 35-year-old woman who until yesterday had stopped the burial of Matungu MP Justus Murunga claiming to be the mother of his two children, was a hawker when she met the late legislator back in 2012.

“I used to hawk uji (porridge) and cooked tubers in Sewage area in Ruai,” she says.

Then her life changed for better.

Ms Wambiri spoke candidly to the Nation, laying bare what she described as a “seven-year union” with Mheshimiwa, in which they were blessed with two children, now aged seven and three.

She says the late MP had been her regular customer when he was a supervisor for Embakasi Ranching Ltd, a land buying company.

“I used to sell him uji or tea every day. Then he fell for me,” Ms Wambiri says.

Her friends would then nicknamed her Wamubunge (MP’s wife), she recounts.

She says he even moved her to a three-bedroom house in Ruai, where she lives.

Change of fortunes

With a change of fortunes, Wamubunge stopped hawking and settled down to bring up the children. When she met the man who’d become MP for Matungu, she already had a son from another relationship. He lives with his grandmother in Ruai.

“I stopped selling porridge and tubers after Murunga said he would take care of me and the children. He rented a house for us and used to meet all our needs,” Ms Wambiri says.

Then the MP died on November 14 at St Mary's Hospital in Mumias, aged 60.

As his two widows went ahead to plan his interment, Ms Wambiri rushed to court to stop the burial, seeking to secure the two minors’ future.

Yesterday, Nairobi Senior Resident Magistrate Peter Muholi lifted an order blocking the MP’s burial and allowed Ms Wambiri and her two children to attend the ceremony in his ancestral home in Matungu.

Mr Muholi further directed that DNA samples be collected from Murunga’s remains to ascertain the paternity of the two children.

The magistrate ordered that the body be released to the MP’s two widows, Grace and Christabel, or the funeral committee for interment on Saturday as planned, or any other date they may prefer.

“The respondents (the two widows) are not opposed to the applicant attending the burial or taking the DNA samples,” he ruled.

The magistrate said the court was aware of the attachment of children burying their father according to the Luhya tradition, but that goes beyond the children’s rights.

Ms Wambiri, who hails from Gikambura village of Kiambu County, says she is “willing to relocate to join the deceased’s kin in Kakamega County if they accept.”

Formalise our marriage

“He loved me and his children. He is the one who named the lastborn when she was born in 2017. He had intimated to me that he would formalise our marriage through a customary wedding under the Agikuyu customary rites then relocate me to Karen,” Ms Wambiri says.

Ms Wambiri told the court that the MP used to visit them regularly.

He was living in Utawala with Christabel. She filed evidence in court to show he was paying rent for them and was footing their bills. Through her lawyer Danston Omari, she filed M-pesa printouts from the MP’s two Safaricom lines.

In her suit papers, she says their relationship blossomed until 2017, when it hit the rocks after he was elected MP with myriad responsibilities piling on him.

But they resolved the problems, she said.

She caught the ear of the court, which barred anybody from collecting the body from Lee Funeral Home to conduct a burial, interment or cremation or in any manner whatsoever dispose of the remains pending determination of the case.

In a countersuit, Christabel and Grace claimed Ms Wambiri and her children were alien to them “since they never heard their husband mention them during his lifetime.”

They sought orders that should the court be inclined to stop the burial at Matungu, she be compelled to deposit Sh10 million as security for costs and also to cater for preservation of the body at the Lee Funeral Home.

The two widows stated they did not oppose the extraction of DNA samples from the body of Mr Murunga to ascertain the paternity of the two children.

They said they did not know Mr Wambiri and “nobody else in the Murunga family knows her.”

On Ms Wambiri’s claims that the MP had not made their relationship public, the magistrate yesterday held that there was no evidence she had made any attempt to be known to the community or the family.

“For seven years she had time to make the relationship known to community and family. Her interest in the application is on DNA, not having the body released to her or challenging the place of burial,” the magistrate observed.

Yesterday, a National Assembly ad-hoc committee announced Murunga will be buried on December 5 and not today to allow for the DNA samples to ascertain the paternity of two children.

Addressing the press at Parliament Buildings yesterday, Mr Wangwe said the family can now proceed with burial arrangement in strict compliance with Ministry of Health guidelines.

“All that has been holding the burial of our brother has now been resolved. Now it is known that we will put our brother to rest of Saturday December 5,” Mr Wangwe said. “We urge all the friends that will turn up for the burial to observe the Ministry of Health guidelines in preventing the spread of covid-19,” he added.

Additional reporting by Samwel Owino