Kenyan woman locked up in Egypt cries out for help

On November 1, 2017, Linet Makena obtained her passport. Since she had made travel arrangements following an invitation from a relative working in Egypt, she took off in February 2018.

At 21, Makena expected to work as a house help in the country and promised her mother, Julia Mwitari, that she would occasionally send her some money.

On arrival in Egypt, she quickly adapted to life and made friends. She fell in love with a student from Tanzania, and they welcomed a daughter on December 4, 2019.

Tough times

Life took a nasty turn after the child's father travelled back to Tanzania after completing his studies and left Makena to fend for herself and the child. Over the past two years, life has been tough after her daughter started experiencing health complications associated with anaemia, according to her mother.

Mwitari, who lives in Nairobi, said before Makena’s daughter fell sick, she used to support the family but has since been spending all her income on her child’s medication.

Then Makena's visa expired in February this year, and she started living on borrowed time.

On May 8, Makena was arrested alongside two other Kenyans following a crackdown on illegal immigrants and is in cells incommunicado.

“On the day she was arrested we spoke on Skype. She told me, ‘Mom, I am sick but I don’t have money to go to the hospital. But don’t worry, all will be well...’ I told her that if I had a piece of land I would sell it so that she comes back to Kenya. Later in the evening, I got the news that they had been arrested,” the single mother told Nation.Africa, in a phone interview.

“I have no money to buy tickets for them since I do domestic work in the city. We have set up a WhatsApp group where my friends have helped me raise only Sh2,000. I fear for Makena and her daughter,” said Mwitari, adding that she will need at least Sh200,000 to take care of all the costs.

She said obtaining travel documents for Makena’s four-year-old daughter was also a tough process since they had to communicate with the Tanzanian father of her granddaughter.

“He had to write a letter confirming that Makena was the mother of the child and that he had no problem with her travelling with her to Kenya. That document will expire next month and we are racing against time so that we raise the money for the ticket before it expires,” Mwitari said.

At their Ruiri home, Buuri sub-County, the family is in distress. Rose Nkirote, her aunt, said the last time they were in contact with Makena was in March.

“She was very close to her grandmother who raised her since they were very close and said she had missed her. We did not know that she had no money since she did not inform us. We wish she had alerted us on the expiry of the visa, we would have started raising money for her,” Nkirote said.

“The problem is that she is not eating since she is stressed because she is worried about her daughter who is staying with a friend,” she said.

John Muthuyia, her uncle, appealed to leaders to assist in bringing Makena home. “We are being told that she is not feeding well. As farmers, it will take us a long time to raise the money and we call for well-wishers to come to help us,” Muthuyia said.

Her grandmother, Hellen Kairuthi, expressed hope that she would soon see her great-grandchild, adding that “we leave everything to God. I have faith that somebody somewhere will hear or cry and help us. Our children will soon be delivered from Misri,” she said.

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