Kenya Stockholm Blog

Now that the late Keegan Kagwe is effectively resting in peace, the Keegan Funeral Committee would like to release this final Report to the public. The Report is long and has to be released in two parts. The mandate of the Committee was three-fold namely: to raise enough money for Keegan’s body to be transported to Kenya; to raise money for tickets of Keegan’s two daughters to enable them travel to Kenya to attend their father’s funeral and to raise money for a ticket for Keegan’s mother to travel to Kenya to bury her dear son. Following the burial of Keegan in Kenya on January 3rd 2014, the Keegan Committee can report that it duly fulfilled its mandate.

Consequently, the Committee would like to thanks all Kenyans, friends, well-wishers and sympathizers who contributed generously at the Keegan harambee to enable the Committee fulfil its mandate. The Committee would like to thank everybody who attended the “Open Houses” plus anybody who contributed in any way to the success of the Committee’s mission. In this respect, the Committee would like to Report that the total amount of cash that was raised during the whole exercise was SEK 75.000 and for this achievement, everybody who was involved takes credit.

Just like with any Committee, there were positive vibes during the fund raising process and negative vibes. Since this is the final Report, the Committee has come to the conclusion that in this final Report, it needs to come to a closure by updating the public about certain key developments which could not be reported as they were happening because of strategic reasons.

The positive side has already been reported – that the Committee’s mandate was fulfilled. The Committee regrets to announce that as the fund raising continued, several set-backs were also playing themselves out in the background, set-backs that the Committee decided to sit on for the sake of transporting Keegan’s body to Kenya. Although some details here may shock Kenyans who contributed generously, the Committee believes that it is time to let Kenyans know the difficulties the Committee experienced at the hands of the Keegan family, namely Keegan’s ex-wife and his eldest daughter.

Immediately after the fund raising, many Kenya-Stockholmers may have been unaware that despite enough cash having been raised to transport Keegan’s body to Kenya, the late Keegan may have been buried in Sweden because of family interference.

Immediately after the harambee on 7th December, a meeting was called at Keegan’s residence between the Committee and Keegan’s family to establish how the SEK 75.000 cash that had been raised would be spent. The meeting was attended by Keegan’s ex-wife, his eldest daughter and Committee members namely Chairman Sandy, Sofia Njoroge, Githuku wa Muirani, Steve Khadir and Keegan’s mother. At the meeting, the bankrolling of SEK 9.000 was deducted from the total amount, leaving a balance of SEK 66.000. Out of this amount, SEK 45.000 was deducted for body transportation cost leaving a balance of SEK 21.000. The ticket for Keegan’s mother was then deducted at SEK 6,000 leaving a balance of SEK 15.000.

At this point, the Committee recommended that Keegan’s family and Keegan’s mother retreat to the kitchen to decide how the balance of SEK 15,000 could be spent. The families never retreated to the kitchen but decided that Keegan’s mother be advanced SEK 5,000 to help with funeral expenses while the daughters could get the balance of SEK 10,000 for two tickets. At that time, tickets were going for SEK 4.800 each and when the meeting ended, the Committee members were happy that the meeting had ended amicably. Prayers were then held to seal the meeting after which Keegan’s family was given the contribution book to scrutinize and Report on any anomalies. It is after this meeting that the situation began to change dramatically, much to the chagrin of Committee members.

Tension between Committee and Keegan’s family
Keegan’s family started spreading propaganda among members of the Kenyan community in Stockholm to the effect that the Committee “had eaten money”. The family’s argument was that a total of SEK 75.000 had been raised but that the SEK 10.000 that had been advanced to the family could not buy two tickets. As far as the Committee is concerned, the spreading of the propaganda was being engineered by Keegan’s ex whom, the Committee believes, was pumping her daughter to make life difficult for the Committee and to try and tarnish the good names of Committee members.

According to the propaganda, the Committee had “eaten” SEK 9,000 while as they gave their version of the story, the family alleged that the Committee had advanced SEK 5.000 to Keegan’s mother knowing well that the SEK 10,000 the daughters had been given could not buy two tickets. The view of the family was that at the minimum, the Committee needed to recover cash that had been given to Keegan’s mother so that it could be added to the SEK 10,000 to enable the daughters purchase tickets to Kenya. The view of the Committee was that at the time cash was distributed, tickets were going for SEK 4.800 but after the family delayed with bookings for almost one week, the price of tickets also shot up thereby complicating the situation.

The position of the Committee was that cash that had been advanced to Keegan’s mother to help with funeral expenses in Kenya had been advanced through mutual consent at a meeting and could not therefore be recovered. Besides, the Committee’s view was that Mama Keegan needed cash while in Kenya and that it was immature for the family to have demanded that the cash be recovered because then, Mama Keegan could not have been able to sort out funeral expenses in Kenya. Although the Keegan family went full throttle on the propaganda front, the Keegan Committee could not hit back publicly because such a move could have hurt the process of transporting Keegan’s body to Kenya.

In fact, tension between the Committee and Keegan’s family began much earlier when Keegan’s ex allegedly refused to attend the inaugural meeting to plan Keegan’s harambee at Keegan’s residence. Secondly, the Committee was extremely disappointed with Keegan’s eldest daughter because when Keegan was on his death bed, the daughter was alerted and advised to rush to hospital because her father wanted to talk to her but she refused, allegedly arguing that she had an appointment at the salon which she could not miss. The dad passed away moments later although sources say that Keegan’s younger daughter did make it to hospital just before her dad passed away.

The Committee believes that the failure of Keegan’s ex to attend the inaugural Keegan harambee meeting contributed to the chaos that erupted at the meeting, leading to the unceremonious exit of two Kenyans, namely Jared Odero and Gerry Midenyo from the meeting. The main problem was that the Committee found it bizarre to begin a meeting to discuss Keegan’s funeral without the presence of a single family member. The expectation of Keegan’s Committee was that with the attendance of Keegan’s ex (who had indicated to the Committee that she was interested in joining the Committee as the mother of Keegan’s children), the family would be represented. This did not happen and the meeting proceeded without a single family member because Keegan’s mother was still in Kenya. The Committee believes that the exit of Jared and Gerry from the meeting following rants by an alcoholic Kenyan woman could have been contained if there was a family member at the meeting.

Bogus Club 1000 member and Keegan family debts
In view of the adverse, dirty and negative propaganda that the Keegan family (especially Keegan’s ex) has been spreading across Kenya-Stockholm, the Keegan Committee believes that it needs to update the public about the full development of events before, during and after Keegan’s death.

Although she continues to seek sympathy from Wakenya with one-sided stories crafted to put her at an advantageous position in relation to the Committee, the Keegan family did not play any key role before, during and after the fund raising. Keegan’s ex is known to have questioned the refund of bank rolling cash but the reality is that she never contributed a coin towards the bankrolling in the first place. The Committee would like to state that it has no quarrel with Keegan’s two daughters because it believes that whatever the daughters did to cast aspersions on the integrity of the Committee or to undermine it was as a result of their mother’s influence.

The experience the Committee had with the family was that of disruption, negative propaganda, shocking distortion of facts and sheer sabotage. It is worth mentioning that although she was a member of the Keegan Club 100 (having signed her name), Keegan’s ex never contributed a coin towards the harambee. Instead, records show that the family has an outstanding debt of SEK 600 incurred out of the beer account which, to date, has never been sorted. At first, the Committee thought that these issues could be resolved privately “family style” but with the family having embarked on an onslaught against the Committee, the public needs to know every minute detail of events. The Committee has to be transparent and accountable. This mission is impossible without full disclosure. Any questions should be directed to Committee.

Okoth Osewe
Information Desk
Keegan funeral Committee in Stockholm

In the next installment on Monday, February 24th 2014, find out how Keegan’s body was almost buried in Sweden after enough cash was raised to transport the body to Kenya. It is an intriguing tale packed with tension, drama and wild surprise!