PHOTO | FILE A Mash Poa bus.
On April 14, 2025, at around 9.45 pm, a woman boarded a Mombasa-bound Mash Poa Bus at the River Road station in Nairobi after a successful business trip.
She sat on seat number 37 and saw an unsettled man moving from one seat to another. Eventually, the man turned out to be her seatmate.
Ms X- name withheld for legal reasons- told Nation that she had put a bag on the seat number 38 before the man asked her to remove it.
“When other travellers arrived, he came to where I was and asked me to remove my bag. I asked him where he was supposed to sit because he was moving all over the place. He told me I was his seatmate, so I removed my bag and he sat,” revealed the lady.
The traveller says the stranger tried to talk to her but she avoided him by turning to her headphones.
“I normally do not talk to people when I am travelling. Upon reaching Mtito Andei, he alighted, I remained in my seat I could see him cooling his tea using two cups,” she said.
When the bus started moving, Ms X says the stranger returned with the two cups and asked her to help him carry as he sat on his seat.
She says by that time, his hand was shaking and he poured tea on her, severally.
The entrance to Coast General Teaching and Referral Hospital in this picture taken on March 19, 2024.
“I returned the tea but he was hesitant, asking me to wait as he put his bag. He had a Swahili accent, sounding foreign like Burundian, Congolese and Rwandese speak. I placed the cups next to him and put back my headphones,” that was the last thing she remembered about the journey.
The next day, she found herself at the Coast General Teaching and Referral Hospital at the triage on drip surrounded by her three friends with ‘new’ clothes.
She says during the journey she had worn a pullneck, a black t-shirt, sweatpants, socks and sports shoes, but found herself in a dera in a hospital bed.
After a few hours she says she regained her speech and was able to walk and move around.
“My neighbour came and wanted to discharge me but she was told that I was never admitted in the first place. She asked for any paperwork to prove I was in hospital to take to the police station. She was later given a triage slip and laboratory results,” she revealed.
On April 17, 2025, she decided to follow up the case. A conductor of the bus company called and asked her to collect some of her belongings, including a purse with some money, ID, and the OB.
The victim called the conductor to meet in town to surrender the belongings.
“When I got them, I went back to Central Police Station because that is where the OB had been booked. I found a police officer who told me she had gone to Mash Bus Company to ask for a manifest but was denied,” said the victim.
She was directed to the DCI officers at Urban Police Station and was assigned an investigator. She said she called the bus company but it was not picked.
Ms X went to Safaricom offices to replace her sim card.
“I tried to block my line but the transaction had already been done and Sh41,500 gone. I checked my bag and found my socks and innerwear missing. I tried calling the bus company to figure out everything, but they never picked up,” she added.
What really happened?
The M-Pesa went to a man known as Ramadhan Mangala. The victim says she is trying to make sense of what happened to her when she was drugged.
“But one thing I know and I will not rest until I get is the name of the person who had sat next to me on seat 38," she said.
She says she was denied rape test at the Coast General Teaching and Referral Hospital.
The woman, who was found with bruises on her body, told police she had been held by Hashim Dagane Muhumed, the prime suspect in the Eastleigh triple murders.
When contacted Mombasa Urban OCPD Maxwell Agor said he is not aware of the incident. This is despite an OB number 20 reported in his jurisdiction on April 15.
Mash East Africa Limited General Manager Lenox Shallo refuted the rape allegations saying nothing of the sort could have happened.
“How could she have been raped when she arrived here wearing jeans?” he charged.
The bus company official said the bus left Nairobi on April 14, 2025 at 9.45 pm.
“The lady arrived here, she was wearing a blackish jeans and t-shirt, she was somehow dizzy. We suspected she could have been drugged. We tried asking our conductor what could have happened, he told us he noticed the passenger was dizzy,” revealed Mr Shallo.
He said the bus company took the responsibility of rushing her to Central Police Station to record a statement before ferrying her to the CGTRH for medical examination.
“She was treated and discharged. We have not seen her since that particular day we rushed her to the hospital. We do not have any reason to refuse giving details of any suspected passenger in our buses,” he said.
However, he said there is a procedure and protocol to be followed.
Mr Shallo said the company respects confidentiality of passengers' data. Since the case was already reported to the police station, Mr Shallo said detectives are supposed to go to the company for investigations and get all the details.
“But she has not come to us. We were astonished to see on social media claims that Mash had refused to give the details; we haven’t refused. But we cannot post names, IDs and telephone numbers of our passengers through social media,” he said.
When asked why it took more than 24 hours to respond to the allegations, Mr Shallo said "not all of us go to social media, some of us are very busy doing other things".
Mr Shallo said the company has been warning its passengers against accepting food or drink from a stranger or anyone seated next to them.
“This is the first case. We have never had such a case of a person being drugged and allegedly sexually abused. We have the name, ID number and mobile number of all our passengers, including the man who sat next to her,” he said.
He said he is not aware who removed her innerwear. Mr Shallo said the move by Ms X took to social media to castigate the company is suspicious and of ill intent, adding that it was meant to destroy the company’s image.
