Ken Walibora, renowned Swahili author and news anchor, dies at 56 in matatu accident

Veteran Swahili author and former NTV anchor Ken Walibora Waliaula, 56, passed away on Friday, April 10, after being hit by a matatu in a tragic road accident on Landhies Road, Nairobi.

NTV was first to report on Wednesday, April 15, with Citizen TV adding later on that Walibora’s body was found at the Kenyatta National Hospital mortuary.

Ken Walibora Waliaula was born on January 6, 1964, at his parents’ home in Baraki, Bungoma. His family moved to Kitale and later Cherangany with the Trans Nzoia region later on shaping up the idea for his book Siku Njema. 

A collage of Swahili books Kufa Kuzikana (left) and Siku Njema (right) by the late author Ken Walibora

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The scholar has over 40 titles to his name. Among the most famous of these are Ndoto ya Amerika and Siku Njema. The latter was a secondary school set book between 1997 and 2003.  Kidagaa Kimemwozea, another popular book was also used as a compulsory text in secondary schools in 2013.

Among other notable books, the author wrote, include Kufa Kuzikana, Tuzo, Ndoto ya Almasi and Damu Nyeusi co-edited with Said A. Mohamed.

Apart from anchoring and authoring books, he also taught as a lecturer in the US.  A teacher by profession, Walibora served as a Swahili high school teacher between 1985 and 1986. He later worked as a probation officer at the Ministry of Home Affairs between 1988 and 1996.

Later that year, he joined Kenya Broadcasting Corporation (KBC) as a Swahili radio news anchor, news editor and translator.

Walibora later moved to the Nation Media Group in 1999, where he worked as an anchor for 6 years.

In 2005, he graduated as a teaching associate at the Ohio State University, US, and became an associate professor in the Department of African Languages and Literature at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, US, on August 24, 2009.

Walibora also reviewed and translated several books. In 2003, he translated Kenya’s draft constitution serialised in the Kiswahili language daily newspaper Taifa Leo.