Editor’s Choice

Bed of nails: Senator weds second wife…on same date he divorced the first!

Maasai men have the least suicide rates over love affairs. The same cannot be said of Kisii men

Burning spear: Samburu Senator Dr Steve Lelegwe and new bride Irene Nakae during their wedding on November 21. “We parted ways on November 21, 2019,” he says “And I wedded the second wife on the exact date this year. there is no timeline for a man to get married after being left or feeling he is not happy. In my case, it has been one year…some women can frustrate you to an early grave.”

By Mbatia wa Njambi

Visiting Thinker

Just imagine Maasai men are the most immune to stress triggered by women in Kenya. They also have the least suicide rates over love affairs. The same cannot be said of Kisii men if their suicide numbers over relationships are anything to go by. The neck of Maasai dudes are hardly found dangling from trees over love.  One reason is their practice of active polygamy and not being answerable to women according to analysis by clinical psychologists at the Mathari National Psychiatric Hospital. Maasai men also have minimal domestic duties-including how their kids are fed or clothed. Even erecting the family manyatta is a woman’s work.

A case in point is Samburu Senator Dr Steve Lelegwe who married a fetching second wife- on November 21-the same date he divorced his first wife last year!

In his divorce papers, Senator did not mention his wife caused him stress or sleepless nights

Fog lights: Senator Lelegwa’s wife Beatrice Maseina, in her replying affidavits, states that they met in 2002, began cohabiting in 2006 but separated in November 2019 over major differences. She cited “cruelty and a hostile and tense environment” which was not conducive for their children’s studies. The Senator sought custody so that the children could rejoin their previous prestigious schools and a life befitting a Mhesh. The Senator has since moved houses in Nairobi and is building a new one for the second wife in Maralal — where Maseina also has a home.

In his divorce papers, Senator Lelegwe did not mention that his wife, Beatrice Maseina caused him stress or sleepless nights which made him underperform his duties when he was Samburu County Speaker-even after she left him six times. “At one time before I became Senator, she used to leave for up to five months. I once told her she would find another woman who is ready to love me.”

Lelegwe married Irene Nakae as his fetching second wife- on November 21-the same date he divorced his first wife last year!

The power of marital stress on men has been used by governments, the military and intelligence officers to win wars, elections

New pastures: Unlike women, men zip up and rarely share their pain, failures, worries. It leads to social isolation, loneliness. Men are as fragile as they are macho. For most, domestic tiff can result in clinical depression, high blood pressure, heart attacks, suicidal thoughts. Most men are socially destabilized, they change plans, lose interest in life.

Indeed, for the rest of us, few situations besides running away from creditors, invisible enemies and battling imminent diarrhea, can stress a man with parental hair on his chest more than domestic squabbles, a quarrelsome wife, looming divorce.

The power of this effect has been used by governments, the military and intelligence officers to win wars, elections, sports bets, tournaments. It has slowed down planned demos, lured political defectors. Here goes…

Raphael Tuju: Wife had an open adulterous affair with GSU guard

Cold comes the night: Raphael Tuju divorce Rose Akinyi, his wife of 27 years and mother of their three children. The divorce took a psychological toll throwing his 2013 Presidential campaigns into a disarray.

Raphael Tuju is chair of Jubilee Party and CS without portfolio. He was running for the Presidency in 2013 and had shot You Tube videos to announce his bid in February 2012. But alas! presidential campaigns stopped even before they started. Besides accusation of violence, Akinyi was also having an open adulterous affair with Tony Ogunda, their GSU guard at their Sh20 million Karen home where it sat on 10 acres. In his petition, Tuju offered Sh200, 000 as monthly maintenance allowance to Akinyi besides paying Sh180, 000 bank car loan balance and her medical bills. But he won’t give her more than that as she would use it “to maintain her jobless young man.” Ogunda was later found murdered that July.

Mwai Kibaki: ‘I know and you know, I have only one wife, Lucy!’

The lioness in winter: Retired President Mwai Kibaki was once so tormented by Lucy’s tantrums that in May 2009 a subdued Kibaki interrupted normal broadcasting for a Special Press Conference at State House Nairobi to announce “I want to make it very clear that I have only one dear wife Lucy and I do not have any other. The truth is known, I have only my four children.” President Mwai Kibaki was Kenya’s Head of State. More importantly, he was the Commander-in-Chief of the Kenya Defense Forces. He controlled the army, the air force, the navy, the GSU, the Police. But under the late First Lady Lucy Kibaki’s drama, he was powerless. Lucy often publicly embarrassed him, a pointer to worse domestic tidings away from public eye.

Lucy was known to issue men with hot military slaps. Like Francis Musyimi, the MC who called her ‘First Lady Lucy Wambui
 during a State House function in 2008. After the slap, Musyimi was whisked away  and replaced as diplomats and a squirming President who had just won an acrimonious Second Term, watched.
Then there was politician Gitobu Imnyara who went to State House in the run up to the race for House Speaker in 2008. He recalled finding Lucy “in pyjamas and bare feet. He started throwing punches at me shouting “nobody comes here without my permission.”

Lucy Kibaki shut down State House Bar…portraying Kibaki as ‘a weak sat on man’

The Second Lady: Kibaki had ‘Nyumba Ndogo’ in the name of Mary Wambui, later Othaya MP . They had one daughter Winnie Wangui. Wambui once recalled: “I met Kibaki in Nanyuki through his cousin who lived there. I was a teacher and I accompanied children performing for the bigwigs. Kibaki was Minister then. You know how these things happen.” Despite official denial, Wambui continued enjoying the trappings of a president’s wife including bodyguards of limos. There was even a photo of Lucy and Wambui in a family gathering.

He threatened to sue for assault besides demanding a goat for Njuri Ncheke to drop the charges. Kibaki called and calmed down the matter. Lucy Kibaki was Chief Prefect, overseeing Ministers, top officials and even State House staff- way beyond her mandate.  She shut down State House Bar! Being called Second Lady by Vice President Moody Awori saw the end of New Year State Balls! But while portraying Kibaki as “a weak sat on man” she protected him from advantage takers and political enemies-especially after suffering a nasty road accident which dogged his presidency.

Moses Wetangula: Second wife, Anne Waceke, clobbered him to shame

Mr Calamity: Moses Wetangula became the butt of political jokes over his domestic affairs. Ian Wasike, a communications specialist, explained that ‘Luhyas are very chauvinistic. They expect nothing but respect from their women…it is worse if the woman is the aggressor.’
Wetangula had in 2013 been taken to court to pay child maintenance by another woman. But it was his admission of being battered by his wife that’s often the reason for being trolled online during debate on contentious national matters. Reason being it’s unheard of for a Luhya man to be beaten by his wife. His domestic rows have thus resulted in a major dent on his image and leadership credentials. Wetangula’s political life sometimes mirrors his domestic one: He has been embroiled in among others; the Sh400 million Dubai Royal family gold scam, the Tokyo financial scandal, being ousted as Senate Minority Leader, to now almost losing his Ford-Kenya party.

Bungoma Senator Moses Wetangula has had long running domestic battles pegged on violence and infidelity. In March 2016, he recorded police statements after his second wife, Anne Waceke, clobbered him after he enquired about an adulterous affair with Congolese music producer named Saint Patrick Ponce Mahele. The two had met at a party two years earlier. But Waceke lost tens of millions in a Nigerian business venture with Saint Patrick. Suspecting that Saint Patrick was bedding an employee, Waceke demanded her money-which had by then gone up in smoke. He then fled to Tanzania and DRC-his homeground. But Waceke, akicheza kama yeye, hired  a female detective who lured Saint Patrick back to Kenya where he found himself cooling porridge at the Industrial Area Remand Prison in Nairobi over “obtaining money through false pretenses.”

Francis Onyiso: Apologized to wife in newspaper advert

Dead ball: Francis Onyiso is a soldier- who are supposed to be tough. But he said: ‘Publishing that apology was one of the most courageous things I have ever had to do. People call me a coward, but they do not know the courage it takes for a man to put everything down and make such a move.’

The former Harambee Stars goalkeeper said there came a time in life when everything stops to matter and in pursuit of peace in marriage, he placed a newspaper advert apologizing to his wife.

Martin Luther King Jr: Sextapes of extramarital affairs sent to wife

I have a nightmare: Martin Luther King Jr and wife Coretta Scott-King. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover bugged King’s office and sent sextapes of his extramarital affairs to him and his wife (who once dated former Minister for Commerce Dr Julius Gikonyo Kiano). The tapes sent King’s head into a tailspin and slowed the civil rights demos as he tried cooling off domestic fires!

The American civil rights leader was heading the demonstrations in Selma, Alabama during the Presidency of Lyndon B Johnson in 1965. King was agitating for the rights of African-Americans to vote. But the non-violent marches resulted in police brutality and death soiling Johnson’s image. Johnson summoned FBI Director J Edgar Hoover for help on stopping them. Hoover, a closet gay, told Johnson that the best way of messing with a man’s head is ruining  domestic peace at home. He can’t concentrate.

The Israeli-Egypt Six Day War: Which officers had a weakness for sluts, strip clubs, brothels and small boys?

Judgment Day: On June 5, 1967, the Israeli air force flattened the Egyptian air base at 8am- when the airfield radar units were at their most vulnerable: staffers changing shifts, having breakfast, taking a leak, gossiping. Generals were also stuck in Cairo traffic-and fighter pilots were still dealing with domestic mess at home when “the sky turned reddish black with the flames from burning fuel trucks and exploding ammunition and aircraft.”

Egypt had the biggest army during Israel’s Six Day War in 1967.  It boasted the best fighter pilots and over 100, 000 soldiers. Israel had under 3,000. But that didn’t help Egypt when Israel unleashed domestic stress on its fighter pilots a month to the War!

But alas! Mossad, the Israeli Intelligence agency knew there was no better way of ruining a man’s concentration than a hostile domestic atmosphere.

English military historian Gordon Thomas in, Gideon’s Spies, informs us that the Mossad got work schedules of Egyptian generals. Most lived outside Cairo and reported to work at 9am: took tea, read newspapers. That was crucial information to winning the Six Day War.

Crying in the toilet: Egyptian soldiers being rounded up as Prisoners of War alongside their generals during the Six Day War. They were waiting for air power from their fighter pilots, but alas! Israel had tied them in endless domestic squabbles.

But of more importance were the private lives of key officers in the air force: Who among the key planners, pilots, technicians and ground crew had mistresses? Also sought were their drinking habits, lifestyle and sexual pleasures: Which officers had a weakness for sluts, strip clubs, brothels and small boys? This information was secretly radioed to the Department of Psychological Warfare in Tel Aviv.

Mono-Eye: Israeli Minister of Defense Lt Gen Moshe Dayan announcing victory in one of history’s most unusual wars largely won through the psychology of men and marital affairs. Egypt had planned to flatten Israel with its air force and army. That other countries in the Arab League; Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon were also joining Egypt got Israelis digging mass graves in temples in readiness for the imminent bloodbath. Egyptian radio played victory songs. The Egyptian Commander bragged “it will be over before lunchtime.” It was never to be.

Shortly, the wives of Egyptian pilots began receiving letters detailing their hubby’s private life. Those who loved sluts were secretly photographed and evidence sent to their wives. The same happened to combat pilots who frequented brothels and strip clubs. One who was exposed to a teacher as gay and the reason his son was performing poorly, shot himself. Spousal animosity saw many pilots and crew reporting late to work. Others were admitted for stress. Divorce cases followed swiftly forcing many fighter pilots to apply for leave- when they should have been practicing air maneuvers!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *