Late Kenneth Binyavanga Wainaina
Kenyan writer, Kenneth Binyavanga Wainaina, is dead
Acclaimed African writer from Kenya, Kenneth Binyavanga Wainaina, has passed on at the age of 48.
The renowned author, winner of the 2002 Caine Prize for African Writing, blogger and gay rights activist, according to Kwani Trust Chairman, Tom Maliti, on Wednesday said that the writer died a few minutes past 10pm at a Nairobi hospital.
He died of stroke.
This was not the first time Wainana suffered from a stroke. In November 2015, he appealed for help after suffering a stroke. He was admitted in the Intensive Care Unit at Karen Hospital and got discharged three weeks later, a source said.
Wainaina, an acclaimed African literary giant and founder of the Nairobi-based journal Kwani?, died after suffering a stroke, according to his family and sources at his Kwani Trust network.
It was Wainana’s short story Discovering Home that scooped the 2002 Caine Prize for African writing and in 2003 he was given an award by the Kenya Publisher’s Association in recognition of his services to Kenyan literature.
He is one of the most high-profile individuals to announce their gay sexuality in Africa having made the bold move in 2014 after publishing an article titled “I Am a Homosexual, Mum” that got Kenya, Africa and the world talking.
An excerpt from the piece relieved him of his closely guarded secret as he let the world know through a re-imagination of his mother’s last days as she lay on her deathbed.
“Never, mum. I did not trust you, mum. And. I. Pulled air hard and balled it down into my navel, and let it out slow and firm, clean and without bumps out of my mouth, loud and clear over a shoulder, into her ear. “I am a homosexual, mum.”
He later tweeted that, “I am, for anybody confused or in doubt, a homosexual. Gay, and quite happy,” putting to rest the debate the article stirred.
That same year, Time magazine named him as one of the “Most Influential People in the World” in its annual TIME 100.
The celebrated author first had his eyes set on a lucrative accounting career before settling on literature.
He moved to South Africa after transferring his credits from the University of Nairobi, where he was studying for a Bachelor’s of Education degree, to the University of Transkei to study commerce.
However, he never completed the degree.
Struggling to make ends meet as a young man in a foreign country, he began to run a restaurant business.
Later, he started writing food and travel articles for the Weekend Argus.
“I was fortunate to reside in a country that is very annoying to live in,” Binyavanga says of South Africa.
Born in Nakuru’s Milimani, Binyavanga says he was a timid and shy child.
“But I feel like now my season is beginning, in this continent called mine, and I am an African; I want no space to not welcome me,” he said while speaking at TED Talks in 2015.
His confession of being homosexual caught many by surprise.
“I am not afraid to talk. In fact, I am doing a documentary on it because this thing must be discussed. Kenyans should discuss it in all platforms but not before they hear the full story,” he said.
And as people were still grappling with this news, he revealed in a tweet on December 1, 2016 — during World Aids Day — that he was HIV positive.
“What I said (in a tweet) is true. I’m HIV positive and happy! That is all I can say,” he said.
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