Alcantara (not his real name), a boda boda rider in Soweto, Nyali subcounty, walks with a limp.
He tells people he was involved in an accident in 2017 while riding his boda boda, hence the limp, but that is not the case.
He was almost killed by a mob during one of the campaign rallies at Kadongo ground in Mshomoroni, Kisauni, after trying to disrupt a politician’s campaign.
“I regret that day,” he tells the Star, shaking his head.
He had been contacted by a friend who had got a ‘contract’ with a politician to mobilise youth to jeer an opponent during a campaign rally.
“Our work was to wait for the opponent politician to start talking and then start jeering him. I thought it was easy money,” Alcantara said.
He had been promised Sh1,500 because he had also brought along about 12 more youth.
And so when the ‘target’ took to the podium to speak, he started his job.
“Little did I know that the politician we had been instructed to jeer had also placed his own goons at strategic points among the crowd,” Alcantara said.
He had unwittingly placed himself in the middle of a group of their target’s goons.
No sooner had he started jeering than blows rained on him. He was beaten senseless and his ankle broken.
On Thursday, Mombasa businessman Suleiman Shahbal said boda boda riders are now being increasingly misused by politicians.
Speaking to over 300 riders at the Tononoka ground, Shahbal said the boda boda industry is huge and time has come for it to be treated with the seriousness it deserves.
“Politics will end in August 2022. There are only eight months to go. Do not let politicians divide you and make you fight one another. That is poor politics,” Shahbal said.
He said with the numbers increasing, riders can form as many saccos as possible to help pool resources and come up with big projects.
“It only needs leaders who have vision to be able to move the boda boda industry forward,” the businessman-cum-politician said.
Shahbal said businesses start from the bottom and a boda boda rider may become the wealthiest owner of a successful transportation company with a fleet of vehicles to boot, if the right environment is provided.
“I also started from the bottom,” the career banker, who donated Sh500,000 to the boda boda riders to boost their sacco, said.
Shahbal condemned the stoning of Deputy President William Ruto's motorcade at Kondele in Kisumu county, saying a thorough probe must be conducted to find out who caused it.
“The first person to help a boda boda rider is a fellow boda boda rider. So don’t let the national politics divide you. If you support one side or the other, do so without lifting a finger on your neighbour,” he said.
Shahbal said he will not force the riders or anyone else to support any particular person at the national political arena.
“I support Baba. Yesterday, Ruto was stoned in Kisumu but Baba was the first person to call it out as bad politics. Let us not adopt bad politics,” he said.
He said the hustler narrative is misguiding Kenyan youth.
“It is not an end. It is a stage that we must all go through so we can reach the top.”
He said the problems that boda boda riders go through at the hands of rogue police officers, the hazardous nature of the business, the struggles they endure with their health among other things, are issues his administration would address,if he is elected Mombasa governor.
“I understand the problem of being without NHIF. Yesterday, I heard there are some projects that have gobbled Sh15 million meant for NHIF,” said Shahbal, referring to the rot in the NHIF.
He said service delivery should be the only marking scheme that politicians should be weighed on, and not race, colour, tribe or religion.
His administration, he said, will ensure each ward is given Sh50 million to help build a youth centre, a women centre and a quality clinic.
“Development should start at the grassroots. I will strive to ensure there is an ambulance in each ward in Mombasa,” he said.
“They said I am dreaming. Yes, I am dreaming big. Many of my dreams have come true.”
-Edited by SKanyara
