Joe Ngigi: Man behind famous Mean Machine RFC anthem

In fact, there are only two club anthems sung in elite Kenyan rugby – one by Machine and Kenya Harlequins.
Mean Machine won the prestigious Kenya Cup in their debut year in 1977, becoming the first all-African team to lift the coveted trophy.

But it was another seven before their “all other teams are sinking sides’’ anthem would reverberate in rugby arenas.

The man behind that anthem was Joe Ngigi, who died on Saturday in Nairobi.

That anthem was composed in faraway Lome in Togo, but to understand why and how you have to start in Nairobi.

Kenya hosted the Organisation of African Unity (now African Union) Heads of States and Foreign Ministers’ conference in Nairobi between June 24 and 27.

The conference required each Head of State to be assigned a personal assistant for the duration of his stay in Nairobi. One Captain Joseph Kariuki was assigned to the Togolese strongman, President-General Gnassingbe Eyadema.

He must have made an impression on the General because the Togolese leader invited Kariuki to call on him if he ever found himself in Togo.

Then in November 1981, Kariuki’s nephew Ngigi joined the University of Nairobi for a Bachelor of Commerce degree. Naturally, Ngigi joined Mean Machine. He also joined AIESEC (International Association of Students in Economics and Business), an organisation for students studying Commerce and Management.

Ngigi became the secretary of the organisation in 1983 and attended a conference in Lome together with his two Mean Machine chums, Andrew Ahuga Mwenesi and Macharia Nyaga.

In an interview with this writer in 2020, Ngigi says he presented a letter of introduction from his uncle to the President of Togo.

“I had informed my uncle of the trip. My first port of call was the President’s residence where I left the letter with the security. At the AIESEC conference a few days later, two gentlemen, emissaries from the President came and asked for me.

The senior one gave me an envelope with $200, whilst his junior gave me a bottle wrapped in a newspaper. It was a three-litre bottle of Single Malt Scotch whiskey from the President’s reserve courtesy of his friendship with my uncle.”

Being students, Ngigi and his buddies quickly decided to throw a party.

“We started singing rugby and Christian songs. It is from one of these hymns that we composed the Mean Machine anthem.”

The lads substitute some words from the Christian hymn “My Hope is Built on Nothing Less”, originally written in 1834 by Edward Mote, an English pastor.

“When we returned to Kenya via a two-day stopover in Lagos, I was met by my comrade in arms, Awuor Sam Onyango, then the kit master for Mean Machine, and over the final dregs of the General’s single malt we chanted the newly composed Machine anthem.

“At the next rugby meeting, the boys in white and blue stripes stood to attention. Ken Nyangaga, Dan Kimoro, Frank Omondi Magunga, Pritt Nyandatt, Tim Githugu, Pastor Kareithii, Ian Amogola, Joshua Ouma, Ken Sagala, Dave Sakari, Evans Vitisia, Ken Obimbo, Andrew Ahuga Mwenesi, Sam Awuor and I led the fans in the anthem. The rest, as they say, is history,” said Ngigi.

Ian Amogola, Ngigi’s colleague at the University of Nairobi said “I do not recall Joe playing rugby at the University but he was an ardent supporter and we credited him with the anthem together with Andy Mwenesi and Macharia Nyaga.”

At the time of his death, Ngigi was a Trustee and Chair of the Advisory Taskforce at Kenya Hospital Authority Trust Fund (KHATF).

Ngigi was born on February 3, 1962, and first played rugby at Mangu and Kangaru High schools, where he studied for his O and A levels respectively.