On the trail of Jacob Juma’s last days

Thursday May 5, began as a normal day for slain businessman Jacob Juma, who will be buried today. According to his wife, Miriam, he left their Karen home around 9am for the city.

According to his lawyer Ahmednassir Abdullahi, Juma, spent most of Thursday going about his businesses. The lawyer said Juma spent one-and-a-half hours in his office in the central business district and left for lunch with some friends at the New Stanley Hotel.

After lunch, he drove to his offices near the Hungarian Embassy in Lavington where he spent most of the afternoon. CORD leader Raila Odinga has said Juma called him around noon on Thursday and wanted to talk to him and seemed worried.

The two did not meet as Raila had a lunch date with another person and later went to the National Assembly to witness MPs vote for the Gender Bill.

Police said Juma was killed between 9pm to 10pm, ten metres off Ngong Road at the southern bypass, 100 metres from Lenana School.

The police also said the late businessman was blocked by a car and shot dead.

A police report filed from Karen Police Station showed two mobile phones, Sh6,500, small amounts of foreign currency and other personal documents were found in the car.

A family source said the police told them that they waited for a few minutes to see whether a person could come to say he knows the dead man. The source however wonders how the police expected someone to turn up when they never communicated to his wife or any family members about the fatal shooting.

Police said they towed the car with the body inside to Karen Police Station and later took it to City Mortuary. It is not known what time this happened. However, a relative who went to City Mortuary on Friday, said they transferred the body to Lee Funeral Home at 9.30am.

Raila came to Lee at 10am to condole with the family and later left.

On Saturday morning, the family gathered at Lee Funeral Home to witness their departed relative’s autopsy. Family members confronted Martin Nyuguto, a police superintendent in charge of the Homicide Unit at the Directorate of Criminal Investigations on why it took detectives more than 20 hours to secure the vehicle he was killed in for forensic investigation.

Nyuguto admitted it took detectives 21 hours long to secure the Mercedes Benz the businessman was driving when he was gunned down, at 7pm on Friday. Juma’s relatives, including his brother Michael Juma and wife Miriam, also demanded to know why the detectives did not find a single cartridge from the scene.

At 3.15pm, Government pathologist Dorothy Njeru began conducting the post-mortem that went on into the night. Preliminary results showed that Juma was killed by two bullets shot at close range. He also suffered serious damage to his right hand, an indication that he struggled with his killers.

On Thursday May 12, at 9.45am, Juma’s body was brought at All Saints Cathedral for the requiem mass.

After the mass, the hearse carrying Juma’s remains used the church’s rear gate to enter Uhuru Park’s main podium at 1.40pm. Politicians including CORD co-principals Raila and Kalonzo Musyoka and MPs Elizabeth Ongoro, Gladys Wanga, Opiyo Wandayi and George Aladwa walked behind the hearse to the park.

Raila spoke for a few minutes to the crowd and introduced Musyoka and Juma’s wife Miriam.

After turning down Raila’s request that members of the public leave the family to take the body home because they were tired, the public viewed the body up to 2.10pm.

Juma’s body was then taken to his Karen home for a night vigil. From the home, the body was taken to Wilson Airport at 9.33am.

Three helicopters transporting Juma’s body, relatives, friends and politicians left Wilson at 11.10am and arrived at Kakamega’s Muliro Gardens at 12.00pm for public viewing. After speeches, the funeral entourage left Muliro Gardens by road via Mumias to Bungoma’s Kanduyi Stadium for another public viewing at 2.17pm. Juma’s body left Kanduyi for ACK Mungore Church for another requiem mass before being taken to his ancestral home, 300 metres away from the church.