Emerging details indicate that the late Mzee Jomo Kenyatta, the nation’s founding father, was strong-willed and had a stubborn charm.
During his tenure, Kenyatta started experiencing vision problems but refused to wear glasses. He instead demanded that his speeches be typed in bigger fonts.
This is according to his former aide and press officer Lee Njiru and the Central Bank of Kenya Governor Duncan Ndegwa, as reported by the Standard.
When the bigger font trick could no longer work, Kenyatta grudgingly agreed to wear glasses.
On another occasion, Kenyatta kept a delegation from Kitui waiting at his Gatundu home for hours. This was to conceal the fact that he was unwell.
He, however, hit out at Ndegwa when he sought the President’s consent to inform the delegation that they could not meet him because he was unwell.
“Are you mad? Has something gone wrong with your head?” he quotes Kenyatta as having admonished him when he tried to save the delegation from further waiting.
According to Ndegwa, Kenyatta did not allow anyone to discuss his health in public.
Kenyatta is also said to have rejected the services of South African heart transplant pioneer Christian Bernard who had been invited by the then Attorney General Charles Njonjo to attend to the President.
Ndegwa recalls how Kenyatta refused to get a pacemaker despite his heart failing.
Rejecting the offer, Kenyatta said that the nation would not play in the league of the apartheid country.
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