POLICE OPPRESSION AND HARRASSMENT

Various aspects of the oppression of the masses are revealed in the novel. The first act of
oppression that Matigari encounters is when he sees some children who are chasing after a
tractor that takes rubbish to the dumping site, since that is their only way of survival. Matigari
sees them running, and decides to follow them to find out what is happening. When he
reaches the dump, he finds a security guard at the entrance, sitting on a chair while the
children are queuing up at the entrance. Every child has to pay a fee to the security guard as a
requirement before entering the garbage site. After leaving the garbage site with one of the
boys, Muriuki, whom he has rescued from being beaten by an older one, he continues his
journey, looking for justice and truth in different places in Nairobi. To his surprise, he finds
the security guard sharing the money collected from the boys with the driver of the tractor
and two police officers. Matigari then asks, “So a handful of people still profited from the
suffering of the majority, the sorrow of many being the joy of the few?” Sometimes the
security guard and the tractor driver grab those good things which the boys collect from the
garbage. Ngugi questions the attitude of the elite with “hardened hearts” who fail to
sympathise with the poor. The police are supposed to uphold the law but they break it and
choose to exploit the boys. It is revealed that sometimes the police would beat and forbid the
boys from entering the garbage site if they refuse to pay or give them what they have picked
from the rubbish, claiming that the boys are thieves. The struggle of the kids to enter in the
rubbish heap for food and pieces of clothes distinctly indicates Marxism in the text.

In another incident in Matigari, the police set a dog on Guthera. Onlookers come around and
start to laugh at the poor woman who is in shock, without giving her any assistance, until
Matigari comes to her rescue. The barmaids are still talking about Guthera and her behaviour
towards the stranger when they hear “the blood-curdling growl of a dog, followed by the
chilling scream of a woman” Matigari dashes outside towards the scene, and to his
amazement, he sees a helpless woman being humiliated by two policemen. Matigari reaches
for his waist to take a gun as he used to do when he was still fighting with Settler Williams on
the mountains. He then remembers that there is no gun as he is wearing but the belt of peace.
He then turns to the crowd watching another person being exploited by the police, and he
shouts: What is going on here? Are you going to let our children to be made to eat shit while
you stand around nodding in approval? How can you stand there watching the beauty of our
land trodden down by these beasts? What is so fun about that? Why do you hide a cloak of
silence and let yourselves be ruled by fear? Remember the saying that too much fear breeds
misery in the land. With a voice like thunder that shakes the ground where they are standing,
he tells them his name: Matigari ma Njiruungi, which means “The Patriots who survived the
bullets”, and informs them that his mission is to protect his people from the hands of those
who are still humiliating them in a free country like Kenya. He then returns to the bar with
Guthera and treats her to lunch before proceeding to his business…an example that brings out
the theme of Marxism.

On the other hand, Guthera becomes a victim of continuous harassment by the police just
because she refuses to sell her body to them as they demand. She makes it a fact that,
although she indulges in prostitution, she will never give her body to a policeman, since she
witnessed her father being killed in prison because she had refused to sleep with the
policeman who handled her father’s case.

In prison, Matigari meets some people who were arrested unfairly, just like him. Ngugi
refers to all their crimes as too small to spend a life in jail, but he sees it as mere exploitation
of the masses. After escaping from prison, Matigari is re-arrested and sent to a psychiatric
hospital because they believe that he is mad because of his behaviour but he again escapes
unnoticed. Believing that Matigari is a dangerous man, the police embark on a hunt so that,
once arrested, he can be brought before the law, whether dead or alive. The authority does not
seem to bother finding out more about Matigari’s mission and why he behaves the way he
does. All they are interested in is arresting him.

On their way (Matigari, Muriuki and Guthera) to the place where the weapons are hidden,
Guthera is shot dead by the police who are following them, before they can cross the river.
But before the police could catch up with them, Matigari, carrying Guthera’s corpse, jumps
into the water and the two are never seen again. Believing that Matigari is a man with
supernatural powers that aim to destroy the leaders of Kenya, the police continue the hunt for
him, using violence.