A few weeks before founding President Jomo Kenyatta's guard, Daniel Kibwezi Ole Muyaa, passed on, he recounted a time President Uhuru Kenyatta almost got him beaten over nyama choma (roast meat).
In a sit-down with The Standard, Muyaa recounted that they were feasting on meat at the family's Gatundu home when the younger Uhuru wandered to where they were.
They offered him some of the meat but unluckily, Mzee Kenyatta saw their generosity and was not quite impressed with it and almost gave them a beating for a second time.
“He was a very social boy, just like he is today. We offered him some meat. Mzee saw this and got very annoyed with us; we never repeated it,” he recounted.
Muyaa and his colleagues had on a different occasion actually received a beating from Kenyatta's Bakora after they burnt his meat while preparing it for his guests.
“One day we were roasting meat for Mzee and his guests and it got burnt. He ordered us to lie down and gave us a few hot ones on our backsides,” he added.
He, nonetheless, loved the founding president because of his generosity and fulfilling a promise to have them get jobs at the National Youth Service.
“Mzee was a good man and he took good care of us. For example, whenever a cow or goat was slaughtered at Gatundu, he would ask us which parts, according to our culture, young men ate, and tell us to take them,” Muyaa told the publication.
He also recounted an emotional reunion with former President Daniel Moi after a long time.
“Moi was moved when he saw me in a wheelchair. He could not imagine someone younger than him could be wheelchair-bound when he was still walking upright. I told him that apart from my legs, I was totally healthy,” he recalled.
Muyaa, 74, died on Wednesday, September 25, at his home after a long illness.
He was a prominent Maasai community elder and a veteran civic leader in Kajiado who served for a long time as the chairman of Olkejuado County Council.
President Uhuru Kenyatta eulogised the late Mzee Ole Muyaa as a patriotic leader who stood firm and fought relentlessly and successfully for the rights of ordinary Kenyans.
"Mzee Ole Muyaa was a man of the people. He was an ardent fighter for the rights and the welfare of wananchi. It was due to his leadership skills that he was able to serve for a long period as the chairman of Olkejuado County Council and the chairman of the then Association of Local Government Authorities," the President stated.
