• The top 20 feature stories of 2019 from the Big Read and Sasa pages of the Star
Image: FILE
Adversity is writ large across the diary of Wanjiku in 2019, but she registered some triumphs that bespeak her resilience. In good times and bad, the Star was there to dig up and document her untold stories on its feature pages.
From having her innocence traded for beads to being a willing seller to willing buyers, from being dispossessed after getting widowed to barely surviving a hammering by a lover, Wanjiku had a long year. But she also made historic innovations and thrived in the international arena against great odds.
The Big Read and Sasa sections captured her struggles and successes in depth through features, a genre media trainer Judie Kaberia defines as, “Colourful pieces that deal with real events, placing an emphasis on the people involved.” Below is a list of the best in 20 categories, starting with one that touches on Wanjiku’s worst fears in this economy.
1. Best TRAUMA Feature
How being declared redundant led one man to alcohol
By Jane Abukutsa
Excerpt: He remembered six years earlier, when the Finance Manager of one of the companies within the group was terminated. He did not inform his wife that he no longer had a job. For eight months, the poor man would leave home every morning at the usual time but he would head to an upmarket cyber café, where he would spend his whole day. Wafula remembers laughing at the man. But now that he, Wafula, was facing the big R, he empathised with the man.
Runners-up:
Family’s horror after missing son pops up online cheering Shabaab
How being tagged ‘spy with a gun’ shook innocent journalist
2. Best SURVIVAL Feature
Diaspora nightmare for Nandi woman clobbered till hammer lodged in skull
By Barry Salil
Excerpt: “I was sweating and trembling, pleading with him to spare my life as I remembered my son Florian and my six siblings and mother, who were looking up to me for support. But he could not listen. When he pulled the trigger, the gun jammed… God had jammed it,” Elizabeth Kogo, 37, recounted.
Runner-up:
Man beats stage 3 cancer after wife fled with treatment funds
3. Best HUSTLING Feature
The resilience of Kenyan immigrants in the US
By Elizabeth Mwarage
Excerpt: “I have fulfilled my dream. I have done odd jobs so that none of my children will do the same. Now that they are all working, I can go back home to retire.”
Runners-up:
How workers hawk goods in the office to make ends meet
Betting addicts throng Uganda to escape 20% tax on winnings
4. Best HARDSHIP Feature
Decades later Shona speak Kikuyu but still lack IDs
By George Mugo
Excerpt: “I have been frustrated. I was born by my parents who I live with in Kinoo. I’m confused since I cannot start a business, and from the analysis of issues, I find myself being confined to being a cobbler. I repair shoes and I can see myself with all the talents I have remaining a cobbler,” footballer James Kiziwacho said.
Runners-up:
Soapstone carvers live a hard life crafting 'white gold'
Plight of interns caught between a sick economy and meaningful employment
Image: FAITH MUTEGI
5. Best GENDER Feature
In-laws from hell grab property, kids of widows
By Malemba Mkongo
Excerpt: “They said I killed my husband so I could inherit the land we had bought. I could not take in the pain of losing a husband and being accused of killing him. It was too much for me,” she said.
Runners-up:
Why odds are still stacked against women in life
READER COMMENT
“Nashami* (not her real name) quietly sat outside her manyatta, watching as other children played, not daring to join them lest her co-wife sees her.” I feel like crying. Really?? In this era and time? Where’s the children dept? Where’s the police? Aren’t these crimes against children? Where are the local politicians? Paedophiles!!?
Username: Thesage Bush
6. Best CHILD ABUSE Feature
By Njeri Mbugua
Samburu morans give beads to bed little girls
Excerpt: “They are babies and should not be having intercourse. It is a traumatic experience because they are not prepared for intercourse at all at that time,” Dr Allan Adungo, an obstetrician, said.
Runner-up:
Sex tourists prey on minors pimped by own parents in Mtwapa
7. Best STIGMA Feature
Shelter where suspected witches feel like hunted animals in Kilifi
By Ernest Cornel
Excerpt: The sanctum, filled with skeletons, jack-o-lanterns and a pot, is for the oath-taking and ‘healing’ the sick. Seashells and oil are among the healing potions the magicians rely on for their rituals. Other paraphernalia are hidden in a hut that is forever kept dark. They possess ‘powers’.
Runner-up:
Don’t judge a woman by her motherhood — Millie Odhiambo
8. Best UNDERWORLD Feature
Streets, apps and brothels: 'Illegal' sex work booming
By Caren Nyota
Excerpt: “Although I was rained on, cheated, arrested and beaten by fellow sex workers, one day I'll go back. Prostitution is like witchcraft, you can't stop it once it's in your blood.”
Runners-up:
‘Devil’s breath’ used to hypnotise, rob victims
Slums fear and revere ‘killer police squads’
How women, schoolgirls are lured into drug trade
How police trap motorists into paying bribes
9. Best TABOO Feature
Why men should not fear vasectomies
By Geoffrey Mbuthia
Excerpt: “A lot of people think it is castration, but it is not. It is a modern, safe and effective family planning method for men whose families are complete,” Dr Charles Ochieng, 45, said.
Runners-up:
Gays vexed but not cowed in fight for space
Culture shock hits Kenyans on women inheriting father’s land
Painful relief: When girls resort to abortion
10. Best LEGAL Feature
Battles for ailing parents’ properties show the need to write ‘living wills’
By Jillo Kadida
Excerpt: The advantage of having a living will is first, you as a parent decide who is best suited to take care of you and your wealth. Secondly, it saves the family from unending legal battles, which sometimes lead to bad blood.
Runner-up:
Why suspects change their minds after pleading guilty
11. Best HEALTH Feature
How herbal clinics make guinea pigs of Kenyans
By Magdaline Saya
Excerpt: They are greeted with a pile of leaflets on the receptionist's table, indicating the diseases they cure and the time frame. They include chronic diseases, such as cancer, gynaecological complications and detoxification agents. Some promise healing in as little as two weeks.
Runners-up:
How patients are prescribed so many drugs, it’s killing them
Image: VICTOR IMBOTO
12. Best ACHIEVEMENT Feature
Strathmore underdogs who downed Harvard to win global law contest
By Lewis Nyaundi
Excerpt: They came to the limelight as not only the first African students but also the youngest to win a global law competition: the John H Jackson Moot Court on World Trade Organisation (WTO) Law.
Runners-up:
How I shed 46 kilos to get six-pack — Mvita MP Abdulswamad Shariff
Air Force aviation engineer does it for God and country
13. Best INNOVATION Feature
Could this Kenyan give the world HIV cure?
By John Muchangi
Excerpt: “Within a few weeks, the HIV is completely gone and there is no rebound,” Prof Benson Edagwa, 37, told the Star in Nairobi.
Innovate or end up ‘tarmacking’: Varsity churns out job creators
Kenyans turn to digital careers as technology alters job market
These are the kind of articles that really give hope. People should read and internalise its contents and go take actionReader by the username Lyc on the modern farming feature
14. Best FARMING Feature
Modern farming needs little rain or land
By Melanie Mwangi
Excerpt: “You find youths migrating from the rural areas to the city in search of work, yet they’ve left a shamba back at home because they were told in the town is where they will get jobs and money.”
Runner-up:
Farmers sell eggs at throwaway prices, burn trayloads as imports hurt profits
15. Best SPORTS Feature
Schools that used to shine in sports now dwarfed in games
By Agnes Makhandia
Excerpt: According to teachers and other stakeholders, different goings-on are to blame for the dip in performance among the once indomitable schools. They cite lack of incentives, age cheating, poaching, academic pressure and change of management.
Runner-up:
How team with quirky goal celebrations lifted youth from crime to world-beaters
16. Best TOURISM Feature
Why Diani risks losing its award-winning tourism appeal
By Mbaruku Mohammed
Excerpt: The research covered the social and economic impacts of dredging activities off the coasts of Kwale and Mombasa counties. It predicts a looming collapse of Diani’s beach-dependent tourism.
Runners-up:
Image: SAM DINDI
17. Best ENVIRONMENT Feature
The change began as a ripple: How ex-gangsters created a park
By Cathy Watson
Excerpt: “It was a mountain of garbage here, a thieves’ hideout. Men could pull you here from the road and God-knows-what would happen,” says Sarah Nyambura, 34, one of the women involved.
Runner-up:
How 'crazy mzungu' built nature park in Malindi in 20 years
18. Best WELFARE Feature
The dream chasers of Mully Children's Family
By Allan Kisia
Excerpt: MCF’s work has inspired many and earned it multiple plaudits. Hollywood star Morgan Freeman flew into the country in December last year to interview the founder, Charles Mulli. The Academy Award winner travelled all the way from the US and spent time at the MCF.
19. Best SHOWBIZ Feature
What makes the Nyege Nyege festival tick
By Davies Ndolo
Excerpt: Kenyan artiste MC Yallah, who made the lineup this year, agrees that the most noticeable aspect about the event is the ability to meticulously put together a festival without any A-list artistes.
Runner-up:
Quality question haunts the push to play Kenyan music
20. Best COMMENTARY Feature
Kenya’s potential undone by barons, cartels — envoy
By Star Reporter
Excerpt: “This country is heaven. This is heaven on earth. You are blessed with great weather. A vibrant private sector and well-skilled youthful workforce. But the government has been taken over by barons and cartels. Nothing moves unless the barons are part of it.”
Runner-up: How graft, high cost of living could spark social implosion
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Congratulations to the writers for delivering such memorable pieces, and thank you to the readers who took time to comment on them. If you missed any, feel free to check it out now. The beauty of a good feature story is that it is timeless.
Compiled by the Features Editor, whose works include ‘‘Handshake’ and Brexit through the prism of a wedding’ and ‘Chess coach Githinji Hinga’s endgame’