Esther Ruguru, a 43-year-old hotelier, who went missing in July 2023. Her family has demanded swift investigations about her disappearance.
The last time Ms Esther Ruguru was seen was on the evening of Saturday, July 1, 2023, boarding a black car at Kiria-ini town in Murang'a.
Ms Ruguru had closed her small hotel that was popular with customers for the tasty mukimo dish.
Her mother, Ms Alice Njoki, 72, reports about a man who routinely took her for an outing every Saturday.
"This had been the routine for about one year until she went missing. The man also used to visit us at my home. She would pick her up either from Kiria-ini town or from my home every Saturday evening and she would come back home on Sunday morning," Ms Njoki recounts to Nation.Africa at her home.
But this time round the mother of three never returned.
Alice Njoki, 71, the mother of Esther Ruguru, 43, who went missing in July 2023 speaks at her home at Kiria village in Murang'a County on October 4, 2023.
This prompted her mother to report her daughter as missing at Kiria-ini police station on July 4, 2023. The incident was recorded under OB number: 07/04/07/23.
It is now 20 months since investigators started asking around and recording statements. But there has been nothing about the whereabouts of Ms Ruguru.
Murang'a Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) boss Mr Obed Isanda says the matter is still under investigation and he is open to new leads to help him find her.
Witness account
Mr Simon Ndegwa, a bodaboda rider, told Nation.Africa he knew Ruguru and saw her on the day she went missing.
"That day I was seated on my motorbike waiting for customers when a black car parked about 20 metres from where Ruguru was standing," Mr Ndegwa says.
"The driver of the car honked twice as he beckoned at Ruguru. She hesitated. A man stepped out of the driver's seat and beckoned. Ruguru then went to the car, got into the back seat and the car sped off.”
Mr Ndegwa says he later found out that she was reported missing.
A report compiled by Mathioya sub-county DCI headed by Mr Muriithi Muriungi indicates that Ms Ruguru was grabbed by unknown people at around 6pm.
"Her phone immediately went off...There was a man identified as Mr Stanley Maina who was to pick her up for the weekend outing," the report seen by Nation.Africa reads in part.
It adds that Mr Maina has since been summoned to record a statement.
But Ms Ruguru's mother denies the DCI statement that the phone was switched off on July 1, 2023.
"I had called Ruguru’s phone number and the call was getting through although not answered on July 2 and July 3 up to noon when it was switched off,” she says.
Denies meeting her
In his statement, Mr Maina denied he met Ms Ruguru on the day she went missing. He says he had an accident that “made it impossible for him to honour the date.”
Instead of driving to Kiria-ini town where he was to pick up his love for the weekend outing, he says he went to Kiria-ini Mission Hospital.
The hospital is about 300 metres from where Ms Ruguru was last seen standing and then boarding a black car.
A police statement indicates the man was admitted to the hospital on the night of July 1, 2023. However, his admission card reads he was admitted on July 2, 2023, at around 11am.
In a phone interview, Mr Maina admits “yes we had plans to meet with Ruguru and go to Othaya town.”
But that date never materialised. “Before I could pick her up, I had an accident that saw me hospitalised the same night.”
“I only wait for God to shed more light on what happened to Ruguru. I am also anxious since she was my good friend,” Mr Maina says.
As the DCI searched for leads, three other males- a public health officer, a contractor, and a mechanic- also recorded statements.
Ms Njoki says the wait has been long and agonizing. It has aggravated her hypertension condition, she adds.
"My daughter has been my sole provider since I was widowed 23 years ago. She also has three children who have now been left under my care," she laments.
She discloses her missing daughter had separated from her husband in 2015 and returned home with her three children.
Ms Ruguru had invested in the small hotel business to make ends meet "but had also expanded to shylocking".
Her estranged husband later committed suicide in 2017, Ms Njoki reveals.
Ms Njoki says she has since been forced to sell part of her land to raise school fees for the first-born daughter who is at Maseno University, the second-born son, a student at Thika Technical Training College, and the third-born at Kamahuha Girls High School.
Ms Njoki complains the local security team at Kiria-ini is not doing enough to find her daughter.
"These officers know where my daughter is. I am not a fool not to know when I am being taken around in circles...They certainly know where my daughter is," she claims.
“I have every reason to believe a person(s) in security participated in her disappearance," she alleges without providing evidence.
Ruguru's mother says she had volunteered to record a statement to help detectives with investigations but she was turned away.
"The officers told me they were not investigating her disappearance in my house, that there was little I knew about the world she was believed to have disappeared into," she says.
Had she been given a hearing, she says, she would have informed detectives that her daughter had expressed fears for her life.
“My daughter had reported to me that there was a woman who had on June 18, 2023, visited her hotel and threatened her with dire consequences,” she says.
Ms Njoki claims a detective bluntly told her to wait for seven years to lapse and file for her daughter to be presumed dead. She says she has three sons and two daughters. "One of my daughters has since died and the other is now missing,” she laments.
The family has been to many mortuaries, hospitals, and prisons in the Mt Kenya region in the hope that they would find her.
Ms Ruguru's eldest daughter, Ms Carolyne Njoki, 23, says her two siblings have been affected by the disappearance of their mother.
" Whatever the circumstances around her disappearance, we need her home. If those behind her disappearance have harmed her, they should let us have her back in whatever state," she pleads.
Murang'a Senator Mr Joe Nyutu says the case has been one of those that makes the government look clueless, complacent, and with something to hide.
"The facts of this case are open leads. It is known who was to pick the woman for a weekend out. That man was later traced to Kiria-ini Mission Hospital with injuries that we are told were occasioned by a road accident," Mr Nyutu says.
“Our efforts to pressurise the investigators to release a sensible report about the incident are met with evasive gimmicks. The officer who was initially investigating the matter was transferred in a hush while two major witnesses are no longer seen within Kiria-ini where they resided," Mr Nyutu adds.
“There is too much the Mathioya detectives are hiding from the family and I will be demanding a written statement from Interior Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen regarding the matter," the senator promises.
