Miss-Delectable
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Daily Nation: - News |Can anyone help me trace my relatives?
"I want to trace my parents and relatives so I can live a normal life like I used to.”
This message was delivered through sign language by a 15-year-old girl suspected to have been a victim of the 2007/08 post-election violence in the Rift Valley.
Her plight at her new home has become a cause for concern among her teachers at a school for the deaf in Machakos town.
Lillian Wambua was brought to the Machakos Rescue Centre, formerly the Machakos Approved School, where some of the children displaced during the violence were taken.
But her situation proved delicate for the centre after it was discovered that she was deaf and dumb, prompting the authorities there to transfer her to the Machakos School for the Deaf.
According to school principal Antony Muthembwa, the girl was picked up off the streets of Nakuru town.
“From the look of things, Lillian was not born deaf and dumb. It is a disability she acquired later on after birth. She appears to have been affected to the point of losing memory, which she is recovering though at a slow pace,” Mr Muthembwa said, adding that when she was admitted, she did not know how to communicate in sign language but was able to scribble her name.
“That led us to the conclusion that she must have attended some formal education before becoming deaf and dumb,” he said.
Dorothy Mutinda, a teacher at the school, has had the girl staying at her home during school holidays.
“But of late the girl has been displaying erratic behaviour, and we think she is missing her family. That is why we are appealing for help so we can re-unite her with her relatives if indeed they are alive,” Mr Muthembwa said.
“She has refused to eat for the last five days. At times she is withdrawn and emotional. I have found her speaking to herself several times, and when I enquire she says she is communicating with her mother,” Ms Mutinda said.
The teachers say they have begun to understand the girl’s plight through her English compositions.
In one such composition entitled My Bad Day, Lillian wrote: “I had a feeling that this would be a tearful day, when I was taking breakfast. I saw my mother did not want to go to work as usual. She told our housegirl to pack her things and take off … My mother was not happy. At lunch time I asked my brother what was going on but he told me nothing.
“Suddenly my mother heard someone knock at the door and she went to open. When she opened one man pushed her against the fridge and others were standing outside the door. My brother took me and we drove to our grandmother. The next day my aunt came to my grandmother’s house and she told her to stay with me at Nakuru for a short time before they know what had happened to my mother.”
In what appears to be an incident highlighting why she was found in Nakuru town, Lillian wrote in the essay: “I was with my aunt at the Nakuru bus station … she told me to wait for her there and that she will come back for me. I waited for her until late in the night but she did not come back. Police saw me and took me to the camp where I stayed with people who I didn’t know. It was in 2007 and I stayed there till 2010”.
Mr Muthembwa says when they were enquiring about the girl’s background she would indicate her home as Ziwani.
“We thought of a place called Ziwani in Makueni County, so when we took her there we realised she was a stranger in the place”.
Rescue centre
Lillian continued in her essay: “On month five, Wednesday, Mr Gitonga (Nakuru Children’s Officer) took me to Machakos School for the Deaf and I met Mr Muthembwa and he gave Muthembwa a letter to take me to the Girls Rescue Centre so that they can find my home; people at the rescue centre took me to Ziwani instead of Siwa; then they told me to show them my home ...
But it was her essay My Life in Tent that made her teachers to conclude that they were indeed dealing with a child who was a victim of the post-election violence.
In the essay Lillian wrote: “Two policewomen and one man took me to a tent with many people. I thought by myself that it was my day to be eaten because I had nothing to say on that day but I was only following what they were writing for me”.
“I was welcomed by one mother who had two children who were young, she gave me a sack and a lesso to be my bed; because I was so tired I took it and slept.”
"I want to trace my parents and relatives so I can live a normal life like I used to.”
This message was delivered through sign language by a 15-year-old girl suspected to have been a victim of the 2007/08 post-election violence in the Rift Valley.
Her plight at her new home has become a cause for concern among her teachers at a school for the deaf in Machakos town.
Lillian Wambua was brought to the Machakos Rescue Centre, formerly the Machakos Approved School, where some of the children displaced during the violence were taken.
But her situation proved delicate for the centre after it was discovered that she was deaf and dumb, prompting the authorities there to transfer her to the Machakos School for the Deaf.
According to school principal Antony Muthembwa, the girl was picked up off the streets of Nakuru town.
“From the look of things, Lillian was not born deaf and dumb. It is a disability she acquired later on after birth. She appears to have been affected to the point of losing memory, which she is recovering though at a slow pace,” Mr Muthembwa said, adding that when she was admitted, she did not know how to communicate in sign language but was able to scribble her name.
“That led us to the conclusion that she must have attended some formal education before becoming deaf and dumb,” he said.
Dorothy Mutinda, a teacher at the school, has had the girl staying at her home during school holidays.
“But of late the girl has been displaying erratic behaviour, and we think she is missing her family. That is why we are appealing for help so we can re-unite her with her relatives if indeed they are alive,” Mr Muthembwa said.
“She has refused to eat for the last five days. At times she is withdrawn and emotional. I have found her speaking to herself several times, and when I enquire she says she is communicating with her mother,” Ms Mutinda said.
The teachers say they have begun to understand the girl’s plight through her English compositions.
In one such composition entitled My Bad Day, Lillian wrote: “I had a feeling that this would be a tearful day, when I was taking breakfast. I saw my mother did not want to go to work as usual. She told our housegirl to pack her things and take off … My mother was not happy. At lunch time I asked my brother what was going on but he told me nothing.
“Suddenly my mother heard someone knock at the door and she went to open. When she opened one man pushed her against the fridge and others were standing outside the door. My brother took me and we drove to our grandmother. The next day my aunt came to my grandmother’s house and she told her to stay with me at Nakuru for a short time before they know what had happened to my mother.”
In what appears to be an incident highlighting why she was found in Nakuru town, Lillian wrote in the essay: “I was with my aunt at the Nakuru bus station … she told me to wait for her there and that she will come back for me. I waited for her until late in the night but she did not come back. Police saw me and took me to the camp where I stayed with people who I didn’t know. It was in 2007 and I stayed there till 2010”.
Mr Muthembwa says when they were enquiring about the girl’s background she would indicate her home as Ziwani.
“We thought of a place called Ziwani in Makueni County, so when we took her there we realised she was a stranger in the place”.
Rescue centre
Lillian continued in her essay: “On month five, Wednesday, Mr Gitonga (Nakuru Children’s Officer) took me to Machakos School for the Deaf and I met Mr Muthembwa and he gave Muthembwa a letter to take me to the Girls Rescue Centre so that they can find my home; people at the rescue centre took me to Ziwani instead of Siwa; then they told me to show them my home ...
But it was her essay My Life in Tent that made her teachers to conclude that they were indeed dealing with a child who was a victim of the post-election violence.
In the essay Lillian wrote: “Two policewomen and one man took me to a tent with many people. I thought by myself that it was my day to be eaten because I had nothing to say on that day but I was only following what they were writing for me”.
“I was welcomed by one mother who had two children who were young, she gave me a sack and a lesso to be my bed; because I was so tired I took it and slept.”