Nairobi News

The Kitui based wife of a Dutch national facing defilement charges in court says she was shocked to learn that his husband had been jailed in the Netherlands with the same offenses of sexually molesting underage girls.

Rachel Hans, the Kenyan wife of Hans Vriens Egon Dieter, the Dutch national accused of defiling three minors in Nairobi says the allegations and subsequent court case have hugely disrupted their humble lives and the charity work of taking care of street children.

In an interview with the Nation at his Kyusyani rural home in Kitui County, Mrs Hans narrated how he met the 65-year-old man in 2010 while staying at Githurai area in Nairobi and dated him for two years before agreeing to marry him.

At 24, she says her only desire was to settle down with her white husband and lead a quiet life and that’s why she opted to buy land in Kitui away from the city.

At first, Rachel flatly rejected our request for an interview but later reluctantly agreed so as to set the record straight because many people had misunderstood them, after media reports linked her husband to child abuse crimes.

She paraded eight girls from different communities staying at their home as beneficiaries of their charity work, saying she has enrolled them in local primary schools.

“I knew Hans must have had a family back in his motherland and he had told me as much but I didn’t imagine he could be linked to such offences as I’ve never seen him behave suspiciously,” she said.

GRAVE CHARGES

When the sex abuse claims first emerged in November 2018, Rachel was visiting family friends in Malindi and the husband was in Nairobi, where he stays most of the time.

“I was called from Netherlands by one of his sisters who wanted to know what was happening. Unfortunately, I hadn’t seen the news on TV and nobody had told me about it. I was shocked by the charges and I’ve been struggling to know the truth because he still pleads his innocence,” Rachel explained.

In the subsequent days, before Hans was arraigned in court, detectives from Directorate of Criminal Investigations raided their Kitui home and ransacked every room, looking for the children who were staying with the couple.

She doesn’t regret marrying the white man who promised to take care of her despite the age difference but she’s frustrated by the turn of events the and deeply ashamed by the negative publicity the court case has attracted.

“Marriage is for better or worse. Here is a foreigner whom I’ve stayed with for 10 years now facing grave charges. The entire country including my home village may be against him but I’ve no choice other than to stick with him,” she said in resignation.

Rachel says she can’t confirm or deny the child abuse charges both in Kenya and the Netherlands but describes Mr Hans is a humble man who may have been a victim of blackmail by women out to extort him.

“I don’t know what happened to him before he came to Kenya because I’ve never visited the Netherlands since we got married but at his age he’s less active sexually and incapable of engaging in such escapades,” she said.

STIGMA

The mother of one, a girl aged seven years is at crossroads, but she has vowed to continue taking care of the children from poor backgrounds.

The couple is currently constructing a two-storey house that can be seen from a distance at the Kwa Vonza-Kanyangi Road in Kitui Rural Constituency, dwarfing other buildings around. Those who know the Dutch national well say he has two wives, with one living in Nairobi.

At the Kitui home, Rachel keeps two dairy cows, several hybrid goats and hundreds of chickens in the two acre compound, where he practices mixed farming.

She also cultivates maize on a one acre farm which she says sustains the children in her care.

Born in Machakos County, Rachel chose to settle with her white husband in Kitui after her maternal uncle sold them the land.

Mr Hans visits his Kitui wife at least twice every month and can stay in Kitui for two weeks although he hardly interacts with other villagers.

Neighbours who spoke to the Nation, said very little is known about Mr Hans but that his wife had borne the stigma of marrying a man seen as a sex pest.