The blast that changed lives forever

The 16 screws holding onto metallic plates binding Diana Mutisya’s spine speak to the painful experience she underwent when the US Embassy in Nairobi was bombed on August 7, 1998.

Twenty-three years later, the physical pain she still feels cannot beat the agony of losing her colleagues to the horrifying terrorist attack at the building on the corner of Moi and Haile Selassie avenues.  

Ms Mutisya was having a cup of tea with her three colleagues - one man and two women - sorting out a problem that had arisen with the disbursement of staff salaries. Then the first blast hit, so loudly that she thought the sound came from a burst tyre or a gunshot.

The second blast sounded when she was taking a sip, and it was so strong the cup cracked, taking out one of her teeth. Then a blackness engulfed her. 

She came to sometime later, finding herself at Mater Hospital, where she stayed for three months. She had head, chest and spine injuries.

“I was in so much pain and it took me a long time to remember anyone. My doctors told me that I had injured my spine and dislocated six discs. They said I would be paralysed from my waist down, and I became so depressed,” she says.

In 1999, she was flown to South Africa for treatment sponsored by the USAid. The procedure was so gruelling that she went into a coma for two weeks. Still, she was told her condition was 50/50 on whether her lower body would be paralysed.

She spent the next six months in South Africa at the residence of Kenya’s ambassador receiving physiotherapy and hydrotherapy. Nine months later, she started feeling sensations in her lower legs. She also suffered a serious chest injury and at one point in her recovery coughed out blood for a year. She developed asthma from inhaling the air contaminated by the bomb blast.

Her journey has been a slow, painful one. She is yet to receive a single cent in compensation for the injuries. She still needs medical attention constantly, just like she did over two decades ago.  

She still experiences occasional bouts of extreme pain. For instance, earlier this year, when she was leaving work, she suddenly felt weak in the left side of her body. Her legs wobbled and a colleague helped her and eventually got her home safely. 

In July, she felt intense back pain. Her blood pressure had spiked.

“I collapsed, and when I recovered, I found myself in a ward. I was admitted for five days.”
One of her spinal discs had moved due to the wearing out of her orthopaedic chair.

“To rectify that, I need to go back to the hospital in South Africa that treated me, and so far, from our consultations, they have recommended that another surgery be done to correct the condition.”

Her medications are costly. To support her chest, she must put on a corset, which is also expensive and wears out easily. Her family budget is strained, she says.

To manage her condition, she says, she needs 10 sessions each of hydrotherapy and physiotherapy per month. Each hydrotherapy session costs sh2,800 and physiotherapy Sh3,500.

“Compensation has also taken a long time. It feels bad because others who suffered the same tragedy struggle to get basic needs, especially now due to Covid-19. It also hurts that the American government ignored us. They compensated their people and ignored the rest of us whose lives changed forever,” she says.

“As the anniversary rounds up, I am grateful for life despite the many challenges. I harbour no resentment and I forgive whoever was responsible. All we want is the government to focus on improving the security of the country.”

Smoke, glass everywhere, then darkness

Douglas Sidialo was a young promising sales officer at Lonrho when the bombing happened. He was 28, recently married and with one daughter. He was stuck in traffic on Haile Selassie Avenue going to work when he saw two occupants in a yellow truck fiercely exchanging words with a security guard at the basement entrance of the US Embassy. 

Then he saw one of the men leave the truck and run towards the railways offices across the street from the embassy with a walkie-talkie in his hand. A few seconds later, three gunshot sounds cracked, then boom!

“At first, I thought the three sounds I heard were gunshots. While still grappling to understand what had happened, a massive whirlwind came from nowhere. Everything around me seemed to be moving in slow motion. I saw smoke, glass flying everywhere, then darkness. I lost consciousness. I have never seen the light of day since that day,” he recounts.

He admits he was scared his wife, a young teacher at Nambale Boys, would leave him. He also knew that his life would take a nosedive now that he could no longer work as he had used to.

His little daughter would forget him because he was certain his wife, who had admitted to him that one of her colleagues was seducing her, would disappear.

“My wife, Teresa Sidialo, never left. She has been the pillar of my life. She stood with me. Now we have three kids, two daughters and one son,” he says with pride.

While in hospital, Mr Sidialo remembers interacting with the then US Secretary of State and he remembers joking with the secretary about the scandal involving President Bill Clinton and White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

Ultimately, he was discharged from hospital with the promise that he would be able to see again in six months’ time. He is still waiting for the miracle 23 years later.  

Despite the harsh events of August 7, 1998, Mr Sidialo has defied all odds and achieved the goals he set out for himself. In 2002, he was invited to give a keynote speech at the Strategies Trauma Awareness and Resilience (STAR) headquarters in Washington, DC, in the US. 

While there, he was privileged to get to lay a wreath at the Pentagon’s River Street entrance in honour of the September 11, 2001 bombing of the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.

Three years later, he became the first visually impaired African to climb the highest peak - Uhuru - of Mt Kilimanjaro. He is the current chairperson of Kenya’s Paralympics team. 

His proudest moment was in the 2008 Olympics, when all the 13 Paralympic athletes came back home with a medal. They cumulatively won five gold, four silver and four bronze medals.

Mr Sidialo is also the first blind man in the world to cycle the entire length of Africa after riding his bike from Alexandria, Egypt, to Durban, South Africa, as the UN’s goodwill ambassador in 2007.

He also has a company - Beutsal International Investments Ltd - which deals in payroll management, branding and building energy power stations.

He is also the chairperson of the Kenyan victims of the August 7, 1998 bombing. His top priority is fighting for compensation from the Kenyan and US governments for victims of the deadly blast.

On June 8, 2010, Mr Sidialo got the opportunity to talk face to face with the US vice-president at the time, Joe Biden, and shook his hands for “almost two minutes”.

“I did not want to let go of his hand because I used that chance to whisper something in his ears. I told him the plight of the bombing victims and he told me, ‘As Americans, we believe in human rights. We will look into your issues’,” Mr Sidialo recalls.

Eleven years later, he wonders whether Mr Biden, now president of the US, still remembers his promise.

Locally, he says his attempts to reach President Uhuru Kenyatta have been fruitless. The victims simply want the State to take care of the August 7 Memorial Park, which they refer to as their sanctuary.

August 7 Memorial Park

Even as they commemorate their lost family members and friends, August 7 Memorial Park General Manager Natasha Mbugguss says the park risks being closed down. This is because they have no funds to keep it going.

“We solely rely on the Sh30 paid by people visiting the park. Since the Covid-19 pandemic, we have been experiencing reduced numbers of visitors from as many as 400 people per day to as few as 20. The government has neglected us. We are a very worried lot,” Ms Mbugguss says.

Joseph Kiragu, the chairperson of the board of trustees of the park, reveals that even paying electricity bills, leave alone the salaries of park staff, is proving a headache.

“We are really praying that we get a breakthrough with the financing. It is the biggest threat to the preservation of this timeless treasure where victims of the tragedy get to commemorate their loved ones and also brings Kenyans together to remember their history,” he says.

To save the park from extinction, the management is running an online funds drive through an M-CHANGA account where Kenyans and donors are encouraged to send as little as Sh100 to paybill number 891,300, whose account name is M-PARK or directly to the Memorial Park’s till number 878005.  

Kenyans are invited to keep track of the funds on the park’s social media pages. Through donations, the park will be kept going for years.

“Through keeping the park alive, we are able to preserve our history. It is very important for us to never forget our history and be able to tell it factually,” says Eva Muraya, a trustee of the park.

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