Photo/CHARLES KAMAU/NATION Ms Zainabu Gondoro with the key to the house that her son Mohammed Gondoro won in the Nation Media Group’s Utahama Lini Promotion.
As she opened the door to their new home, Zainabu Godoro recalled with nostalgia that her father was laid to rest on the very day and hour, last year.
But her memories were not filled with grief as she saw this as a gift from her late father, whom she believes “is watching over them”.
Her son, three year-old Mohammed Godoro Kamau was recently crowned the fourth winner of the Nation Media Group Utahama Lini? Promotion, making him the owner of a Sh4.7 million house.
Ms Godoro received the life-changing phone call on July 4 that broke the good news to her. “I believe it was all fate since we were just celebrating my father’s first anniversary and didn’t know anything of this nature could happen.
“My father died on July 4 last year and on the same day this year, my son won a house,” said a beaming Ms Godoro, who was accompanied by her family members to view the house in Kitengela’s Oasis Park estate.
Little Mohammed, during the Kitengela visit, remained unaware of what was happening and held onto his mother’s dress.
But the events that took place before Mohammed won the house had been heart-rending, bringing the entire family to its knees.
According to Ms Godoro, the three-year-old had been sick from the time he was six months, and had to face the surgeon’s scalpel because he had a hole in his heart.
Since then, he has been in and out of hospital, incurring in huge medical bills. The young Mohammed also had his adenoids surgically removed to let him breathe with ease.
The adenoid is a lump of tissue at the back of the nose above the tonsils that helps fight infections in the nose and throat.
Breathed his last
The tissue, when infected, has to be surgically removed if antibiotics fail to cure them. The surgery took place as Ms Godoro’s father breathed his last.
So, how did a three-year-old win a house? Ms Godoro said she helped her son cut and paste the pieces, and write his name and her mobile phone number on the promotion’s entry form.
Mohammed used to tell his mother that they would move to a better home every time the Utahama Lini? Promotion was aired on television. “My son would encourage me by telling me almost everyday that we would get a new home.
“He would say ‘mother, we will move to a new place.”’ Ms Godoro, a housewife, says her sisters and close relatives mocked her for entering into a promotion that “already had winners”.
“My sisters laughed at me when I told them that we were participating in the promotion. They said that nobody genuinely won such things,” recounts Ms Godoro.
She also fell out with her husband at some point for his habit of at times buying newspapers and not food when he came home from work.
The 30-year-old-mother of two later agreed with her husband that they use their children’s name to fill the entry forms.
Her husband, Mr Joseph Ndung’u, used to bring newspapers home everyday when he came from work and so Ms Godoro would write Mohammed’s name while her husband would write their elder son Abihanifa Mungai’s name.
The parents would include their phone and identity numbers as planned. The Ndung’u family later learnt that the first person whose name was picked during the draw that declared their son a winner did not answer when called by the Nation Media Group Utahama Lini? Promotion customer care.
The entry forms had to be reshuffled and another winner, Mohammed, was selected. Emotions ran high on Tuesday as other winners went to confirm the existence of their houses in Kitengela.
Mr Francis Mwangi, an auditor, is the second winner while Ms Jacinta Wakomo, a businesswoman, is the third winner.
Mr Mwangi was driving from Kangema where he had attended a prize giving event and was heading to Nairobi when he received a phone call informing him that he had won one of the houses. “I had to pull over before I could hear more.
“It was so unbelievable that I could no longer drive myself and had to take a taxi after leaving my car in Murang’a,” said Mr Mwangi. Mr Mwangi, 50, is a father of four daughters.
Opmerkingen