Mourners at a homestead in Mukonge Village, Lugari Constituency in Kakamega County, Kenya were reportedly left in shock after four different vehicles hired to transport a body to a nearby mortuary broke down in mysterious circumstances.
Kepha Abukusi,88, died on Sunday, September 13, prompting the family to convene an urgent meeting that resolved to have the deceased’s body taken to the mortuary for preservation as burial plans continued.
In preparation for his burial, his family hired a van to transport his corpse to Chebaiywa morgue in Lugari.
However, after loading Abukusi’s body onto the van, the vehicle’s engine mysteriously failed start.
The family was forced to hire another van which failed to ignition shortly after being fuelled at a petro stationwhen the body was loaded onto it.
“The owner of the first vehicle helped us to bring in another vehicle whose engine failed to start immediately after fueling at a local filling station,” Evans Odari stated.
The same happened when a third and fourth vehicle was hired. Mysteriously, every time Abukusi’s body was offloaded, the vehicles’ engines roared back to life, eyewitnesses disclosed.
“We prayed before putting the body into the vehicle hoping that we would reach the morgue safely but about two kilometres away, the vehicle could not move any further,” explained Odari.
To get to the bottom of the mystery, a local mechanic was called to inspect the vehicles. Unsurprisingly, the mechanic could also not pinpoint the mechanical problem.
When the body of the octogenarian was pulled out of the vehicle and elders cancelled plans to take their kin to the morgue, the car smoothly drove off leaving hundreds of onlookers mouths agape.
According to Abukusi’s nephew, Evans Avoga Odari, they had to return the deceased’s body into the house to perform traditional rituals to appease the deceased into “accepting to join the next world”.
“We suspect that he (Abukusi) doesn’t want to be separated from us just yet, hence his resistance to leave the homestead,” said Odari.
