In August 2015, news made rounds that a former MP had been admitted at the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital's private wing and was in need of cash to clear his medical bill.
Former Busia North MP Oduya Oprong had been rushed to the hospital after his health deteriorated at his Angurai home in Busia County's Teso North sub county.
Mr Oprong, since 1994, has lived a miserable life- journeying between his home and hospital- following an attempt on his life.
He was shot in the head at his Nairobi home as he reversed his car to start a 480 kilometres journey to his constituency in Busia where he had a fundraiser to attend.
In an interview with a local newspaper in 2015, he narrated how the June 1994 incident completely changed his life.
"I was in the house along with my daughters in Mariakani Estate in Nairobi," he was quoted as saying.
"After the 7pm news, I got into my car, but as I reversed the vehicle, unknown gunmen shot me in the head."
He was rushed to the Nairobi Hospital but when his condition improved, he was flown to London although in a coma for specialised treatment.
Later, he was transferred to Maryland Hospital in the US where doctors successfully removed one of the bullets that was lodged in the head.
The doctors, however, advised that removing the remaining bullet lodged behind his brain would end his life.
Since then, the once powerful assistant minister and ally to Kenya's first Vice President Jaramogi Oginga Odinga has lived with the bullet tacked in his brain.
The condition has left the 80-year-old frail and at one point he suffered a stroke that almost ended his life.
He currently lives in a dilapidated house in Angurai village in Busia County's Teso North sub county.
On Saturday July 9, thanks giving prayers were held in remembrance of the 1994 incident which closed doors to his political dreams.
Some of the country's top leaders including Cord leader Raila Odinga, former Presidents Danel arap Moi and Mwai Kibaki, former Attorney General Charles Njonjo, former Cabinet Minister John Keen and former Assistant Minister J D Otiende were to attend the event.
Oprong remains one among the few surviving former MPs who sat in Kenya's independence Parliament of 1963.
He was appointed Labour Assistant Minister after he founded the Kenya Quarry and Mine Workers Union before joining the Economic Planning Ministry in 1993 as an assistant minister while serving as MP for Busia North.
During the 2015 interview, he narrated how his close friends abandoned him after he retired to his rural home after the shooting.
"The attack changed my life and even those who were once my close friends and held key positions in government have stayed away as my health deteriorated," he said.
During the struggle for independence, Oprong was among politicians who agitated for the release of Kenya's first President, Jomo Kenyatta, from prison.
He, then, closely worked with former trade unionist Tom Mboya, Jaramogi Oginga and Moi in ensuring the British colonialists freed Mr Kenyatta, then, imprisoned at Kapenguria.
During the thanks giving prayers on Saturday, Cord leader Raila Odinga used the occasion to call on government to swiftly act and end the wave of extrajudicial killings as currently witnessed in the country.
"Twenty-two years later, we do not know who the shooters of Hon Oprong were and why they did it," Raila said in a speech read on his behalf by Busia Women Rep Florence Mutua.
"We probably shall never know the shooters and the motive. And who knows? The shooters who wanted to end this life over two decades ago may themselves be dead, leaving their victim to outlive them."