In an unexpected turn of events that reads like a Hollywood script, the family of Abdullahi Issa Ibrahim, who had been believed to have vanished from this mortal coil during an Al-Shabaab incursion nine years ago, is now elated beyond words. It’s the kind of news you don’t expect. Photo: Citizen TV/Cornelius Ronoh. Source: Twitter.
Hidden away in the serene locality of Maili Nne, Eldoret, a family that had long mourned is now celebrating the miraculous news that their beloved relative, Abdullahi Issa Ibrahim—a Kenya Defence Forces officer thought to be deceased since a tragic encounter nearly a decade ago—is, in fact, alive. It’s like stumbling upon a treasure you thought had been lost to the ages.
So, what really happened to Abdullahi Issa Ibrahim?
Sometimes reality has a way of throwing in plot twists that rival any fiction. Imagine the shock when Ibrahim’s face suddenly appeared all over the internet, thanks to a viral video. In this digital age where videos spread faster than wildfire, Ibrahim made a heartfelt plea, reaching out to the powers that be in the Kenyan government, yearning for a way back home.
Clad in his KDF uniform—a stark contrast to the dusty, war-torn backdrop of Somalia—he stated, “I am a Kenyan soldier. I joined the army in 1986. The Al-Shabaab captured me on January 15, 2016, during the Al-Shabaab raid at the KDF camp in El Adde.” After nearly nine years in captivity, his words are a testament to resilience and hope. One almost wonders, is he their Houdini, back from an impossible escape?
During these long years, Ibrahim’s family carried the burden of believing he had left them forever. His daughter, Kadra Abdullahi, poured her heart out on Citizen TV, recalling how a call from a strange number in Somalia jolted her reality a month before the compelling video took center stage. “Initially, I was dumbfounded. Could it really be him?” Kadra recounts, her voice tinged with disbelief mixed with the possibility of the impossible. “The voice claimed to be my father, throwing my entire world into a spin.”
Without concrete evidence, doubt loomed large like a cloud over their newfound hope. “We needed proof. I urged him to have whoever was holding him to send a photograph or any form of identification,” Kadra explained. Their desperation came with the insight that modern technology could bridge the gap between life and assumed death.
The revelation of Ibrahim’s fate resurrected old grief for the family—a ghost of their collective pain returning to haunt them anew. The Kenyan Defence Forces had previously sealed Ibrahim’s fate with a death certificate. It was a paper trail that the family held onto, deriving closure in a ceremony they believed was a farewell.
“We went through with all the rites, believing my father had passed on,” Kadra recalls, with a hint of nostalgia and sadness intermingling. The past is no longer behind her; rather, it’s knocking vigorously at her future’s door.
Today, Ibrahim’s kin remains steadfast that the captors are choosing a dialogue dance exclusively reserved for the Kenyan authorities, a move they hope will finally lead their loved one back to them.
Astoundingly, Ibrahim isn’t the only one who seems to have danced with fate and lived to tell the tale. Imagine the curiosity when, in a parallel narrative, a 24-year-old Ugandan named Ashraf Bamusungwire returned home after supposedly perishing in a catastrophic road accident.
Bamusungwire’s saga began on September 25, 2024, when his family went through the somber rites, even arranging for an ambulance to ferry what they believed were his remains from Migyera, Nakasongola District, where the tragedy reportedly struck him during a quest for casual labor.
With a stunning plot twist worthy of a Sherlock Holmes novel, he re-emerged, very much alive, just two days before the scheduled ‘duwa’—a Muslim funeral rite. As they gawked, their jaws dropping in disbelief, his family performed time-honored rituals to cleanse and welcome back the prodigal son.
One can’t help but wonder at the stories within stories, like patchwork quilts—incomprehensible unless unraveled, examined piece by piece. In the end, both families flashed a smile at fate, reminding us that in the dance of life and death, sometimes the music stops only to begin again. After all, life has its own quirky way of mending broken chords.
Source: TUKO.co.ke | Report by Axadle
