When a person goes missing, a mad search ensues. A report is made to the police and the subject’s face posted on social media with pleas for information on his or her whereabouts.
Hospitals and mortuaries are searched in the hope of finding the person bedridden or dead.
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Often, the missing person is found. But when the person is not found, detectives lose interest and move on to other urgent cases. Friends also quit the search and only very close loved ones keep the hope of finding the person alive.
Jane Wambui Oluoch and her family fall in this last category. Her husband, Michael Oluoch, disappeared mysteriously never to be seen or heard from again. He left behind four children and a pile of debts.
Speaking to the Nation at her home in Narok, Ms Oluoch said she was away in Nairobi studying when she received a call urging her to rush home.
“In October 2007, when our last child joined nursery school, I went back to school to improve my education. My husband agreed to fund my education and stayed behind in our Narok home with children and the house-help. Barely a month into my higher diploma course at KMTC in Nairobi, a relative called to tell me to rush home as Michael had gone away and the children were alone,” Wambui recalled the painful events.
Shortly after the call, she received a text message from her husband, saying that he was going on a trip but was not sure whether he would return.
He instructed her to sell the car he used to run his taxi business if he did not come back by the following Monday.
“I got home and found that indeed the children were alone, even the house-help had gone away. He had left the car and his SIM card with a friend. There was no way to reach him,” Wambui said.
She called close friends to help her figure out her next move.
MEDICATION
“A friend reported the case to the police and the search began. I received calls to go and identify bodies in mortuaries and none of them was my husband’s. I got tired,” she said.
Wambui suddenly realised that she was alone with four children to take care of and educate. Her youngest daughter, Susan Waithira, is a special-needs child.
“When she was 10 months old a house-help dropped her, her brain shook and she developed epilepsy. She has been on medication ever since,” Wambui narrated as Waithira, now 16, listened before she lost interest and walked away.
She no longer goes to school and is being taught Maasai beadwork to help her earn a living. Her medication costs about Sh30,000 per month. When Mr Oluoch left, Wambui had taken a loan to buy him a car to boost his taxi business. She was left servicing the loan.
“In 2016, I received a letter telling me that the five acres of land we had here in Narok would be auctioned in two weeks’ time. It turned out that he had taken a loan and used our land as collateral. He had not told me about it,” she said.
It emerged that Mr Oluoch and a manager at a local Barclay’s bank branch had agreed to borrow Sh0.5 million and share the money. He gave the manager Sh300,000 and retained Sh200,000. Each was to service his share of the debt.
DEFAULTED
Mr Oluoch completed repaying his, but the manager defaulted. Wambui asked her brother to sell another piece of land to pay the debt and save the land from the auctioneer’s hammer.
“Even after all that, I can’t get the title deed for the land because it was in my husband’s name. There is no death certificate, so I cannot be named as the administrator of his estate,” she said.
Wambui has found a lawyer and is in the process of being named the administrator of the property she shared with her husband. She also lost a piece of land in Migori County that the couple had bought and built a house on. They had planned to settle there, but since the property had no title deed and the sale agreement was in her husband’s name, she gave it up because, according to the law, she had no claim to it.
“I keep telling women in church that a marriage certificate is not enough to ensure they get automatic transfer of their husbands’ property. Property should be registered under both spouses’ names,” she advised.
Enricah Dulo, a family law professional, said the process of having a missing person declared dead is long and tedious. “If a person goes missing and is not heard from or seen for seven years, there will be a rebuttable presumption that he is dead,” she said.
RESISTANCE
“The mother of a minor can apply to the High Court to have the father declared dead. Her application should be supported by an affidavit from the man’s family stating that they have not seen or heard from him for over seven years. Also important is a report from the police saying that a report on the person was recorded. A letter or an affidavit from the local chief will also suffice,” Ms Dulo said.
She said that if a judge is convinced that the application has merit based on the evidence provided, then she can grant an order declaring him dead. The order can be used to obtain a death certificate, then the spouse can be issued with letters of administration of his property.
Wambui is not the only one who cannot move on after a loved one goes missing. Julius Mutui has been missing since April 2005.
His family reported his disappearance but the trail soon ran cold. His father died in 2008, still holding on to the hope that he would be found. His brother, Peter Kilonzi, however, decided to move on and divide the family property. There was resistance, as the process required the input of the missing Mutui.
EXPENSIVE
Mr Kilonzi moved to court in 2015 to request that his brother be presumed dead and a death certificate issued to enable the family to share out the property.
Justice George Dulu threw out the case, stating that the evidence provided was insufficient to show that Mr Mutui should be presumed dead. He said that no relative, other than Kilonzi, had sworn an affidavit to the effect that Mr Mutui had disappeared. The judge asked him to file another application and follow the right procedure. Assets in the name of a missing person cannot be shared out without a death certificate.
The same happened when Veronica Wanyaga Mugo sought orders from the court to declare her husband, Pius Mukono Murage, presumed dead. He disappeared 10 years ago.
But Ms Mugo was told that the court did not have sufficient evidence to grant her request. “My view is that the applicant has not adduced evidence to warrant the court to issue the order. Section 118A of the Evidence Act envisages that a missing person is not one who has not been seen by one person but by those who might be expected to have heard from him,” ruled Judge Lucy Gitari. Wambui said that after all her troubles nothing can now faze her. She said she was willing to go through the lengthy and expensive court process to finally get peace of mind.