By Neto Agostinho
Johanna Ngeno—Ngong MP—has rested. He will be buried tomorrow in his village of Mogondo in Emurua Dikirr Constituency, Narok County. Many things will be said about him in death. Many people will claim him; many will chastise him even in death. My spirit would not rest if I did not eulogize him.
I have had a hell of a week. When the news of the helicopter crash broke, we were on the road doing the #UkatibaCaravan. I have not been able to summon the mental energy to write. I thank the heavens that I had the privilege to call him a friend, colleague, and compatriot.
Born in penury, he died in opulence—a locus classicus of rising from grass to grace. A young man who almost died from famine ultimately died in a helicopter crash: the paradox that is life.
The late Johanna Ngeno was a study in courage, perhaps hardened by the struggles of his childhood. He must have stared death in the eye several times, until the circumstances no longer mattered.
The year was 2013. I had just been re-elected MP for Ndhiwa Constituency. I changed my parliamentary committees and chose the more legislative ones: the Committee on Delegated Legislation and the Justice and Legal Affairs Committee.
I met this Member of Parliament in the first committee—and again in the second. Both committees largely consisted of lawyers and advocates because they handled the legislative work of the House. Ngeno in 2013 was neither a lawyer nor an advocate. Yet there he was in both committees—sometimes causing trouble, most of the time.
During the first months of committee sittings, he would keep quiet, studying the room. When conversations became too heavy with legalese, he would hurl the bill onto the table, throw his hands in the air, and say, “You lawyers think you know everything! You can keep the bill.”
Then he would walk out. But as he walked out he would add, “I will also study this law so that you people stop intimidating me!”
True to his word, he later enrolled at Mount Kenya University and was admitted as an advocate by the time of his death.
What made us friends with Ngeno was not the committee membership. It happened when he took to the floor one day in 2013 to debate a controversial Community Land Bill being pushed by the Jubilee administration. I watched him debate and call the administration some colorful adjectives that I quite liked. I knew then that I wanted him to be my friend.
When the day’s sitting ended, I walked up to him. I wanted to know him more. I was recruiting members for the Kenya Parliamentary Human Rights Association—an association of parliamentarians from both sides of the political divide that we were forming to defend and protect human rights in the 11th Parliament and beyond.
He had been elected under KANU—perfect fit.
He mentioned during our conversation that he had gone to Maseno School. I told him in return that I had attended the only high school in Kenya, which made us both laugh.
He shared with me how he lost his first election in 2007 to a Konchellah in what was then Kilgoris Constituency—an election that pitted the Maasai against the minority Kipsigis community. The gunfire that preceded the declaration of results, he told me, haunted him to that day.
It is how the Kipsigis eventually got Emurua Dikirr Constituency carved out of the larger Kilgoris. But who even calls a constituency by such a name? Anyhow.
Ngeno quickly started devouring human rights instruments, both regional and international. He became particularly interested in minority rights and refugee rights. He had a deep-seated hunger for knowledge on human rights in a way that was both serious and curious.
Ngeno’s greatest test as a member of the Parliamentary Human Rights Association came when we received a petition from evictees of “Sierra Leone” in the Maasai Mau Forest. Police had torched their homes and burned schools, leaving thousands homeless.
As an association, we agreed to go and see firsthand what was happening.
Being a Kalenjin KANU MP who at the time was aligned to Jubilee, we wondered whether he would show up. He was among the first to reach our holding area in Narok town.
At “Sierra Leone,” he spoke to community members one by one. You could see pain engulf him. I am not sure, but he could have been reliving something from his past. He listened with rapt attention.
When we returned to Parliament, we prosecuted the petition and he seconded it. Several months later, Parliament agreed with us that the rights of the people living in “Sierra Leone” had been violated. It was some victory. It emboldened us that fighting for rights in Kenya was possible.
We took on several violations thereafter.
What struck me most was when Ngeno requested to second the petition I was moving on the Kenya Human Rights Policy. Kenya had not developed a human rights policy since independence. Some human rights defenders petitioned us to have one developed.
When I moved the petition, Ngeno requested to second it. He told me he wanted to be part of human rights history in Kenya—and indeed he was. Through our petition, the Attorney General eventually developed a national human rights policy.
All this human rights and legislative work we were doing while Ngeno was still a senior bachelor. It cost us our reputation many times with our partners. We would commit to work on legislation or policy in the morning, but Ngeno’s sun would not rise until around 11 a.m.
To our chagrin, he would have “adopted an oryx.” And as always he would remind us that the rest of us were married, while he was still searching for the appropriate oryx.
I am happy he eventually found and adopted a permanent oryx—the love of his life—in their time. He was a great man and, I am sure, a great father too.
Ngeno was ambitious. When we last spoke, he was certain he would run for President. He cared deeply for his community. He was the kind of person who could not look at evil and turn away.
He loved defending rights. Being in trouble for good reasons gave him an adrenaline rush. He believed his community deserved better.
He carried deep-seated anger, which is why he fought the police when they violated rights and confronted violators wherever they were. Each time he spoke about the suffering of his people, you could hear a voice choked with emotion.
Perhaps that anger was burnt away in the helicopter crash.
However, given that the circumstances of the crash are still unclear, I am sure Ngeno would have fought his death if he saw it coming. I know he will find peace knowing that death ambushed him.
I am sure the travails of his community will still trouble him even in eternity.
May the people of Emurua Dikirr find respite.
May his family find solace.
May Johanna Ngeno Ngong’s heart find peace at the feet of the Eternal Father.
-Editor’s note: The author is a former Member of Parliament. This article has been published basically in honour of his former colleague Johana Ngeno who died in a chopper crash last Saturday.