Why Ngugi wa Thiong'o disappointed Kenyans, Africans in death

Ngugi wa Thiong’o departed the earth after 87 years of productive life of writing and popularising the African ways. He then disappointed his global followers, mainly Africans in the continent and the diaspora, by getting himself cremated in America, the headquarters of post-modern colonialism at times called globalisation. He inspired and disappointed, taught and de-taught, and in cremation he went against the very African ways that he had stressed on earth. He did not allow his global followers to mourn the African way. Prof Ngugi was, wrote City University of New York's David Monda, “a man of many contradictions”.

In his effort to ‘decolonise the mind’, he mounted cultural battles to fight mental remnants of colonialism that lingered into postcolonial times. Although his cultural battles were initially small, their global consequences were huge because he dared to challenge the assumed goodness of paternalistic neo-colonialism which, to him, negated the heroism of Mau Mau warriors. He thus became a postmodern warrior not just of the Mau Mau, but also of African interests and values.

Intellectual defence of the Mau Mau became part of his earthly occupation and could be seen, in his last days, singing Mau Mau songs while in Georgia, USA, hosting Martha Wangari Karua, a latter-day Mary Muthoni Nyanjiru. He looked frail but spirited, defiant but lonely. When he died, his worldwide supporters wanted to give him a fitting African send-off to the world of his ancestors; they were disappointed that in cremation, he denied them the opportunity to mourn the African way. 

As a result of denying admirers a chance to mourn him, his family’s internal frictions and tragedies played in public galleries. His wife in America, Njeeri, had left him in an incomplete divorce process. He thereafter led a lonely old age life, despite having many admirers. One of his son’s, Mukoma of Cornell University, said he did not know about the cremation, which raised questions as to who in the family decided to turn Ngugi’s remains into “grains” of ash. Previously, Mukoma had accused his father of battering Nyambura (Mukoma’s mother). Ngugi’s heroism was in rising above human shortcomings into becoming a living legend only to disappoint in death. He disappointed because he had become a public asset thereby giving the public a right to his fate.

Heroes tend to become public property and therefore end up as everyone’s concern. As families and clans clash over what happens to the remains of a hero, the public demands a role in the decision and emotions run high. In the 1980s, Kenya witnessed such emotions in the SM Otieno case in which the Court of Appeal decided that prominent people should be buried in their nyalgunga (ancestral home); not where the widow wanted. Heroes tend to lose privacy and end up as everyone’s concerns. How to dispose the remains of a hero who had become public property can be a source of family fractioning and frictions. Ngugi was such a hero, a public possession that had ceased to be family property. What happens to his earthly remains was therefore a public issue.

Ngugi was not the first to disappoint by being cremated. While there was little emotion attached to Wangari Maathai, a Nobel peace winner, as a champion of tree planting and environmental security, because people understood her decision, it was different with Kenneth Stanley Njindo Matiba.

A man of means and athletic ability Matiba had become a living legend by sacrificing all in order to point out that something wrong was in the country. He disappointed in death because he denied people an opportunity to mourn, the way they had mourned Julius Gikonyo Kiano. Thousands of Kenyans including President Daniel arap Moi, former Minister Munyua Waiyaki, Kiano’s classmate at Alliance, and even Edith Matiba crowded Weithaga to bury a legend. By getting cremated, Matiba denied them that satisfaction. Ngugi has similarly disappointed.