EMMAH HANDA

Emmah Handa Chikati entered the world in 1949 within the quiet village of Eregi, Kakamega County. Her parents raised four children, with Emmah being part of a household composed entirely of girls.

In the years that followed, a heavy emptiness settled over her childhood home as every single one of her sisters passed away, leaving Emmah entirely alone to carry the memory of her childhood family.

Her education began at Eregi, where she managed to study only until class four. The young girl wanted to keep learning, but the harsh reality of missing school fees forced her to drop out of the classroom permanently.

Returning to her mother’s side, Emmah spent her teenage years performing grueling farm labor and walking long distances to sell bananas just to put food on the table. It was during one of these banana-selling trips to visit a friend in Shinyalu that she crossed paths with Andrea Handa, the man who would become her husband.

The couple established their home in Shinyalu, eventually welcoming five children into their lives.

Raising a large family required endless struggle, as Andrea possessed only a tiny piece of land, forcing the couple to continuously till fields for other neighbors just to secure a basic meal.

Emmah would lead her five children into the fields of Isecheno, breaking the earth into twenty-foot measurements where the children manual-weeded for a mere two shillings per section.

Poverty was so severe that the children routinely missed school to labor for food. Life grew even more tough after Andrea passed away, leaving Emmah a widow to carry the burden alone.

Today, her adult children remain trapped in the same cycle; her two daughters rely on unstable, low-paying farming and banana hawking, while her three sons have no permanent employment, struggle heavily with alcohol addiction, and cannot provide any support.

Relief finally arrived through Emmah's last-born daughter, Caroline Handa Msinzi, who encountered a friend while hawking bananas who mentioned the support offered by Mama Ibado Charity organization (MIC).

Caroline followed the guidance, presented her mother’s identification card, and the team enrolled Emmah into the senior's feeding program on February 24, 2024. Through this intervention, Emmah now receives a monthly basket containing essential nourishment like maize flour, sugar, tea leaves, milk, salt, cooking oil, and specialized porridge flour to rebuild her physical strength.

Beyond nutritional support, the program has directly targeted her failing health, ensuring she accesses a medical clinic every single Thursday for vital check-ups and treatment.

Despite these life-saving improvements, Emmah still survives under incredibly challenging conditions inside a fragile mud house that completely lacks electricity. Her aging body, broken by decades of intense manual labor, remains frail, meaning she still requires ongoing donor funding to sustain her specialized medical treatments and daily nutrition.