For Collins Obondo, the fight against police brutality is a cross-generational struggle that he is sustaining.
Obondo, the son of late activist Benna Buluma, told the Star that even before his mother died, he was working closely with her in her activism work, documenting cases of police harassment, brutality and killings.
The 39-year-old father of one girl said that together with his mother, they would help victims seek justice.
“I worked closely with my mother after my two brothers got killed by police yet they were not in protest. They killed them for protesting and in return, we became professional protesters,” he said.
Last Friday, Obondo received his mother’s posthumous lifetime award, immortalising her work.
“In life and in death, I’m very proud of my mother. This work is sacred, and it is multigenerational. I’m proud to take it up,” he said.
With his mother dead but honoured, Obondo said he has a new impetus to carry her legacy of standing up for the poor affected by impunity.
“I also deal with cases of gender-based violence besides extra-judicial killing and enforced disappearance. This honour of my mother has put fire in my belly.”
His two brothers, Victor and Benard, were felled by a police bullet in 2017 during the post-election protest as the police tried to quell the riot in Mathare.
Bernard was a tailor at Gikomba market, while Victor was a casual construction worker.
On this day, their mother was expecting them back by 3pm as they had left their children with her.
Unfortunately, they were caught up in the chaos as they walked down to their mother’s house.
The duo was coming home from town and was not part of the protest.
They were only caught up in the melee and bullets meant for alleged deviant protesters hit them.
The two left young families who fell under the care of the mother of the two men, Buluma.
Known informally as Mama Victor, Buluma spoke about this pain in every forum she got to encourage families that have been victims of trigger-happy cops.
Jolted by the pain of her loss and burden of shouldering the care of her orphaned grandchildren in Mathare slums, Buluma thrust herself in activism, speaking out against police brutality and injustice.
She once said “if anybody forgets about me as a proud mother of my sons because the state snatched them from me, they will never forget the fight I did in challenging police impunity and violence.
She founded a network bringing together mothers of victims of police brutality and extra-judicial killings in the informal settlement, at some point bringing a class action suit demanding for compensation.
The outfit was called Mothers of Victims And Survivors Network, Kenya.
She died earlier this year when flash floods swept her house along the bank of the Mathare River in the dead of the night.
The Defenders Coalition’s award that she was honored is called Munir Mazrui Lifetime Achievement Award and has been given in the past to notable names like Prof Micere Mugo (deceased) in 2022 and Paul Muite in 2023.
The lobby described Buluma as a resilient advocate for justice whose work must be immortalised to “remain an inspiration to all, that indeed we have a quest to conquer, a just society where human rights and fundamental freedoms are protected, where the rule of law is upheld, and constitutionalism remains our solid guiding light.”
