Media personality Ciku Muiruri says she has forgiven two men who abducted her daughter and her friend in Nairobi's Westlands area on June 4, 2023.
The former radio queen recounted the events of the early June incident in a recent interview with a local daily.
Ciku believes that her prayers led to a safe reunion with her daughter Erica Muiruri, 26, and her friend Shanice Agose, 27, who were abducted after requesting a ride to Kilimani area on taxi-hailing app, Bolt.
The prayers, she said, may have stopped the abductors, especially the main suspect, from harming the two girls.
"A year ago I wouldn't have forgiven him. I would have wished something crazy on him, but where I am now, I have empathy for him. When I pray for this guy, I don't know what brought him here and what circumstances made him do this and be when I prayed for him that whole week that was the reason they didn't rape my kid. I feel sorry for the guy because he is married and he has a child whom he mentioned to my daughter and they have no idea what he does," Ciku said.
The daughter, Ciku narrated, could feel the power of the family's prayers, during the horrifying moment.
"She says she could feel our prayers throughout the whole experience. She saw things happening to the guys (abductors) like them getting confused or getting ill," she added.
But Erica has not fully recovered from the experience and has been having trouble getting some sleep at night.
Erica's abductors, Timothy Kiragu, 34 and Samuel Kipkurui, 33, were arrested last Sunday following a raid at a house in Ngoigwa area in Thika.
After a brief interrogation, the duo led detectives to Gatukuyu in Mang’u, Kiambu County, where their victims were rescued.
Ciku described her reunion with her daughter as pure joy.
"That was pure joy. There is a chapel near our home. I grabbed my mum and my little brother and said let's go to the chapel. And I didn't even tell them what had happened, I just wanted to get down on my knees and thank God. (It was a lot to go through, I must say, and I still get traumatised every time I see her number because they used her number to communicate with me and there's a photo of her that I've saved so that when it rang overtime it would bring up her picture," Ciku added.
The kidnappers had demanded a Ksh250,000 ransom from both parents and are believed to have fed the girls mandazi and water. Police said the girls were rescued alive but visibly weak and shaken.
"Assorted crude weapons and fake motor-vehicle number plates were recovered from the suspects," the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) said in a statement.
Bolt has distanced itself from the incident, blaming impersonators for the girls' ordeal after it emerged that details on the car that picked the girls were different from the Bolt's profile of the vehicle the victims had requested.
"We strongly discourage the use of vehicles that do not match the details on the platform as this was one if the issues that led to this unfortunate incident," Bolt said.
"To address this we show riders the driver and car verification details when they request a ride," they added.
Ciku reacts to Bolt statement
However, Ciku faulted the company for blaming the victims, saying they "need to do better".
"They need to do better. They shouldn't blame the victim. Yes, these guys had fake plates, so it's very disingenuous for Bolt to say it's her fault because she didn't check the plates. What am I supposed to do as a person who hails a taxi and I check the plates and they match and then you tell me it's my fault?
"Bolt is responsible for the safety of many people, this is not an individual that you are telling to do better, this is an organisation that needs to be held accountable by the powers that be and they need to get their systems in order so that every Kenyan who gets into a Bolt, Uber or any other taxi service is safe," she said.
