Public Relations man Lumiti laid to rest
Journalist-turned-Public Relations consultant Cedric Lumiti Khabuchi was laid to rest at his home in Kakamega County on Saturday afternoon, in a ceremony, witnessed by thousands of mourners and performed under the Luhya customs.
Lumiti, who affectionately dubbed the ‘bullfughter of PR’ by his peers, passed on a fortnight ago in Nairobi after battling pneumonia and anemia for close to six months.
And his final passage provided an opportunity for his relatives, friends, neighbours and colleagues to pay their last respects as well as witness first hand the community’s traditional funeral rites.
Among them were tens of isukuti dancers who danced on Lumiti’s grave and later “flattened it” minutes after burial.
The same dancers moved around the community “celebrating Cedric’s life for the next hour while singing songs of praise and requesting the deceased to go well and pass their greetings to the forefathers.”
MOURNING RITES
“Go well my son Cedric, pass my regards to your dad George. God knows how your family will survive,” Cedric’s mom Sharon said while eulogizing the deceased.
Cedric’s bereaved wife, Sharon, was immediately whisked away moments after the burial and put under watch in her late husband’s house.
She will remain there for the next seven days and will not be allowed to shake anybody’s hand.
During this period she neither cook nor perform any chores, not even bathing any of her young children. She will also be required to wake up at 4 am every morning to bathe in cold water.
The widow will finally be required to shave off all her hair so as to begin “her life afresh”.