Elders plan ceremony to lift curse between families during Mau Mau war
A milestone ceremony is set to be held in Lari, Kiambu county this weekend to end age-old bad blood between Kikuyu families in Mt Kenya occasioned by the Mau Mau war.
The bad blood has been cited as the main reason why unity has remained elusive in the populous community.
Kiama Kia-Ma elder, Dominic Ng’era, speaking in Nyahururu said there is a “curse” within the community that was left by the Mau Mau who decreed that their families and those of the “Ngati” (people who sided with the colonialist) “will never wine and dine at the same table.”
“Today, the children of Mau Mau and those of the Ngati have intermarried oblivion of the “curse”, Ng’era said adding that there is need to hold the cleansing ceremony to remove the curse.
The Lari ceremony will be the culmination of many consultative meetings by the community elders.
The ceremony known as “Horohio” will involve appeasing spirits of Mau Mau fighters who died when they had vowed that there would never be any association between the two sides and their families.
“Despite that curse, children and grandchildren of the fighters and those of the home guards have continued to intermarry oblivious of the consequences. That is why we have so many single mothers because the marriages cannot hold.
Bad blood
“This has made it necessary to hold the ceremony at Lari to mollify the spirits of the dead fighters and end the bad blood between families that arose from supporting two sides of the freedom war,” said another elder Peter Karanja.
Mwangi Kariuki said the horohio ceremony will also witness handing over of a sword to signify end of the Mau Mau’s image of war.
Other elderly people from the community claim that unfulfilled promises made to God by the Mau Mau freedom fighters could be the reason Central Kenya is facing serious social fabric breakdown.
Surviving Mau Maus in Nyandarua said while they were in the forest fighting for freedom, they promised to build God a place of worship if He enabled them to defeat the colonialists.
“We promised God that if we won the battle, we would build Him a shrine but we won and over 50 years the shrine has never been built,” Ngigi wa Mwangi said.
He added; “Without fulfilling the promise then we will continue living under a curse. That is why you hear of killings within families in areas occupied by Kikuyu, Embu and Meru.”
