Woman sells baby for US$179 to buy drugs

Kenyan woman Faiza Wanjiru has told the Nation newspaper that she sold her son for Sh20,000 (US$179,68)  to buy drugs.

Wanjiru who left her home because her mother had arranged a forced marriage for her said, "At age 13, I ran away from home to Nairobi. I found myself in the streets of Nairobi as an urchin, got pregnant, and found someone to buy the baby for Sh20,000."

According to the paper, She was given Sh10,000 when she was five months pregnant and immediately she delivered on December 6, 1998, she handed the baby to the female buyer and was paid the balance.

But she and the baby buyer were arrested a day later. She found herself at Kirigiti Juvenile jail in Kiambu County for the offence. Then, she escaped after only a week in confinement.

Meanwhile, her baby boy was placed under the care of a guardian.

Wanjiru's mother later traced the baby and took him in 2005. Wanjiru was reunited with the baby the same year, but she could not live with him owing to her lifestyle.

The paper further added that she was using bhang, alcohol, miraa, and cigarettes and she sank deeper into drugs, she became a con-woman and a robber operating in Nairobi, Kiambu, and Narok counties, where she targeted wealthy revelers, spiked their drinks, and stole from them.

She was jailed and remanded five times till 2014. By 2015, her daily budget was Sh400 for alcohol, Sh200 for miraa, Sh200 for brown sugar, Sh100 for bhang, Sh100 for cigarettes, Sh80 for buying spiking drugs, and Sh20 for food.

Wanjiru finally became a born-again Christian in 2016 before she moved back to the rehab in Murang'a where she gradually put her life together again.