On July 29, Cyrus Omaset was heading home on his motorcycle in Likoni and stopped at a vegetable stall to buy tomatoes.
But when he turned after buying the Sh20 tomatoes, his motorcycle was no longer there.
It have been loaded into a waiting police van. He is not a boda boda rider.
“The police told me I had no helmet, insurance and driving licence, which was all true,” Omaset said.
He was sentenced to 21 days in jail or a fine of Sh15,000.
He could not afford the fine and had to serve his jail term, during which he missed the birth of his child, which was within a week of his arrest and sentencing.
Majivuno Mwasambu, a matatu conductor, was arrested at Markiti.
He was operating without a public service vehicle certification from the National Transport and Safety Authority and other documents.
He was sentenced to 21 days in jail or a fine of Sh10,000.
“I could not pay the fine,” Mwasambu said.
His wife and child do not know where he has been for the past one week.
“I could not tell my wife because it would have stressed her,” Mwasambu said.
The two were among 20 petty offenders released on Saturday from the Mombasa Remand Prison, famously known as Jela Baridi, in King’orani after Mombasa Women Empowerment Network paid their fines.
Most of the 20 had been jailed for three months but had served between a week and one month.
“These are people with families and in most cases are the breadwinners. When they are jailed for petty offences, most likely it is because they cannot afford the fines,” chairperson Amina Abdalla said.
Their fines ranged between Sh8,000 and Sh20,000 and the organisation paid Sh160,000 for their release.
Speaking at Jela Baridi after overseeing their release, Abdalla said there is need to have a formula that will not necessarily involve incarcerating petty offenders.
This could involve reducing the fines for petty offences, she said.
Such incarceration, Abdalla said, only exacerbates prison congestion and increases the government cost of feeding prisoners.
Mombasa Women Empowerment Network, which runs a mental illness hospital in Port Reitz, Changamwe subcounty, has started another programme of paying fines for petty offenders.
The initiative was launched on Saturday, with the 20 convicts becoming the first batch of beneficiaries.
Apart from paying their fines, the organisation will also facilitate the acquisition of licences and resolution of other small problems that landed them in trouble with the law.
These include paying for driving licences of drivers without one, paying for the acquisition of public service vehicle licences for conductors and drivers.
“In many cases, these young people are arrested because they do not have various permits, licences and even uniform when they are at work, because they earn so little that they prioritise food and other basic needs over these documents,” Abdalla said.
Most of the petty offenders released on Saturday earn an average of Sh250 a day.
With this, it is difficult to cater adequately to their families needs and save something.
“This has contributed to mental health issues. It brings stress, which leads to depression,” Abdalla said.
“Most of the patients we have at our facility in Port Reitz are suffering because of unemployment. This leads to a lot of stress, which leads to substance abuse and eventually causes depression and subsequently causes mental illness.”
She said they have to counsel women whose husbands have been jailed for petty offences because of the many calls for help they receive.
Abdalla said they cannot keep on treating mental illness without getting to the root of the problem.
She said they find it better to be proactive and prevent the mental illness than treat it.
“If we can help avoid the factors that lead to mental illnesses then we could be saving a lot of money that goes to treating the malaise,” Abdalla said.
She urged stakeholders to come together and have a conversation around preventing mental illnesses.
