In summary
- Contributions are always done late in the evening by young men and women including children.
- Turns out these are not real funerals complete with fake portrait of pictures pulled out of social media meant to swindle residents.
In Kibera slums you will not miss funeral meetings characterized by loud music interrupted by a Master of Ceremony calling for contributions.
The contributions are mostly carried out late in the evening.
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How you are Swindled
Young men carrying plastic plates basins are seen walking to people for their contributions.
Turns out these are not real funerals. They are fake funerals complete with a fake portrait of pictures pulled from social media meant to swindle Kibera residents of their hard-earned money.
“I have been doing this work after dropping from school in Form 2. Most of the time we usually collect money from different streets here in Kibera, so people here know me very well,” said a 22-year man who requested for anonymity.
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Cursed money
According to the boy, they use the money they get to buy drugs, give to girlfriends and also do other businesses.
“We need money because majority of us use drugs and are jobless. Where will we get the money to buy drugs? We also need to impress our girlfriends.”
At some point we extract a picture of someone from Facebook we design it so that we may use it to contribute money,” he added.
Apart from collecting money in fake funerals, the group also looks for bereaved families and help them fundraise. They in return demand a portion of the money collected which sometimes goes up to half the amount.
“When contributing the money, we will give a quarter to the family and then keep the rest. The family also gives us a token of appreciation.”
We visited Sam Ombongi who lost his uncle. He confirmed that this people usually give a small token to the family of the late.
“I once lost my brother, and they came to ask us to allow them to raise funds for us. We allowed them, but they were giving us Ksh.550 after collecting over Ksh. 1,000. From this amount we have to still give them something as appreciation fee.” Said Ombongi.
Before such contributions are made the family of the late has to seek permission from Nyumba kumi to okay the contributions. A Nyumba Kumi Official who spoke to Ghetto Radio on condition of anonymity, confirmed knowledge of the funeral collections.
“It is true those people don’t surrender the money that they have contributed a hundred percent. They give like a tenth. But they are very violent and may come for you for pursuing this story,” he said.
