Monday, January 2, 2012

Relief as woman finally bids husband farewell


By Maureen Odiwuor

The New Year signifies new beginnings, hope and success.
While many have made wish lists for the year ahead, Benta Ouma jealously guards her newfound happiness which springs from death, courts, victory... and finally burying a loved one.
Since December 2010, her husband’s body had been lying in the morgue awaiting a court case filed by Benta’s father-in-law, Apollo Obanda, to be resolved before burial.
It was great relief when, finally, Benta’s husband, Nicholas Ouma, was buried last Friday.
Benta Ouma is happy after the court ruling that allowed her to bury her husband. He has been in the morgue for a year.[Photo:James Keyi/Standard]
He was to be buried in January last year, but his father, unhappy with the burial site, went to court to stop the ceremony.
Ignorant of the turn of events, mourning relatives and friends had gathered at Kisumu District Hospital’s mortuary to collect the body for burial only to get a court injunction deterring the burial of Ouma at his home in Wawidhi B in Nyando District.
The mourners were shocked. But Benta, had to quickly overcome the shock and take on a new role of fighting for her husband’s body.
She had been married for more than 25 years and her wish was to bury her husband according to the Luo traditions. Obanda was of a different opinion and Benta, a mother of three daughters, believes he was out to frustrate her because she has no sons.
Obanda did not want his son buried at a parcel of land he bought in Nyando before his demise because his late son’s home there "was not built according to the Luo customary laws".
Had no home
Obanda wanted his son buried in his ancestral home at Nyakunguru village in Muhoroni arguing, during the judgment of the case on May 25 last year, that at the time of his death, Ouma was staying in a rental house, meaning he had no home. Yet Ouma had started constructing a home on his plot where his widow wanted him buried.
He lost the case but appealed 28 days later, saying without a home, his eldest son had to rest at his father’s home.
Benta poured water on this argument saying her father-in-law had broken the same traditions by building a house for the youngest son in the homestead before his eldest (the deceased).
"That’s why he never showed up when my late husband put up a fence, built a latrine, established a gate and started a foundation for the house at the purchased parcel of land," Benta told The Standard.
Divorcing in death
Benta said as a Christian, her husband had the church bless their new home before starting construction.
"Allowing my husband to be buried in his father’s home is tantamount to divorcing him in death," says Benta.
Appeal Judge Hendry Chemitei made the ruling and ordered that the burial ceremony would continue at the deceased’s home and not at his father’s. He further ordered the two conflicting parties to share the mortuary bills, which stood at Sh100,000 last month.
Tedious journey
"I find that it would only be fair and just to dismiss the plaintiff’s claim and the deceased be buried in his home in Wawidhi B," ruled Mr Chemitei.
It has been a long tedious journey that ended on Friday, December 30, when Ouma was buried, exactly one year since he died. Although Obanda and his two sons didn’t attend the ceremony, it was a relief for the deceased’s immediate family to bury him and move on with their lives which had been in limbo for that long.
Benta had to abandon her mitumba business, which was booming at Ahero market before her husband’s death.
"I have lived like a cursed woman for the last one year," she told The Standard soon after the court ruling in her favour before weeping sorrowfully.
She has been surviving on handouts from from relatives and well-wishers because Luo customs dictate that a widow whose husband has not been buried should not interact with people openly.
This is known as okola, a weird situation that a widow is supposedly in, until after burial and inheritance by another man. It makes her a social misfit, someone to run away from in case calamity follows you after the encounter.
"If I get in contact with someone’s child, the baby might die for I am still in okola," she adds slowly, painfully.
The delay in burying Ouma didn’t just affect his widow but his children too. Firstborn Keziah Ouma says she had to drop out of Kisumu Polytechnic where she was studying for a Diploma in Hospitality due to financial problems.
"Finally my husband can rest in peace," Benta keeps repeating. "After his burial last Friday, we can begin the New Year with a peaceful conscience."

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