For 41 years, David Mwangi worked around molten steel at an Athi River rolling plant.
The work was unforgiving. Steel had to be lifted, rolled, shaped and moved. Mwangi says his colleagues nicknamed him “The Bull” because of his physical strength and his ability to handle heavy reinforcement bars.
But in his seventies, the man who had spent decades defying the weight of steel found himself struggling with something far more personal: his own body.
And then came a family dispute that would take him to court.
According to Mwangi's account, his son, Kevin, sought an order declaring him incapable of managing his own affairs and appointing someone to manage his estate.
At the centre of the dispute was the elderly man's health, his home in Kitengela and his pension income.
Mwangi says he regarded the application as an attempt to take away his independence at the moment when he was most vulnerable.
His son's alleged position, however, was that his father could no longer safely look after himself.
That distinction is important. A court application concerning a person's capacity is not, by itself, proof that a relative intends to steal property. Nor does an individual's physical disability automatically establish incapacity to manage financial or legal affairs.
Those questions ultimately belong to the evidence and the court.
From steel worker to patient
Mwangi says his physical problems developed gradually.
After decades working on hard concrete floors around heavy machinery and extreme temperatures, he began experiencing pain in his knees and hips.
At first, he ignored it.
He continued working and living as he had always done.
But the pain eventually became severe. He says his joints became swollen, climbing stairs became difficult and, on one occasion, he fell inside his house and remained on the floor for hours before reaching a telephone.
According to the account, medical examinations subsequently identified serious degenerative joint disease affecting his hips and knees.
The story claims that doctors recommended joint-replacement surgery and that the potential cost of treatment was beyond what Mwangi could comfortably afford.
Those medical details would require confirmation from his medical records before publication as established fact.
What is not in dispute within Mwangi's own account is the central fear that accompanied his deterioration: losing control over his own life.
His wife, Miriam, had died five years earlier from cancer, he says.
The house therefore represented much more than property.
It was the home he says he and his wife built over many years.
In the compound stood an avocado tree associated with the birth of his son.
His monthly pension and NSSF income, he says, amounted to about KSh31,000.
For Mwangi, the house and pension were the remaining symbols of independence after retirement.
The confrontation
Mwangi alleges that Kevin and his wife, Mercy, eventually confronted him about his condition.
According to his account, they argued that he could no longer safely live alone and suggested that the house should be sold so that his care could be financed.
Mwangi rejected the proposal.
He wanted to remain in his own home.
Soon afterwards, he says, he received a court summons.
The application allegedly sought to have him declared incapable of managing his affairs and to have a guardian or manager appointed over his estate.
For a 73-year-old man who had spent most of his adult life earning his own income, the application was devastating.
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