Ken Mijungu Opens Up About Caring for His Ailing Father and the Pain of His Final Goodbye

Ken Mijungu has opened up about one of the most difficult chapters of his life, revealing the sacrifices he made while caring for his ailing father and the heartbreaking circumstances surrounding his death.

Speaking on the Lessons at 30 podcast hosted by Dr. Ofweneke, Mijungu reflected on the emotional burden of becoming his father’s primary caregiver and being the last member of the family to see him alive.

The Son Who Stayed Behind

Mijungu, a respected journalist and lawyer, comes from a large polygamous family of 21 children. His father had three wives, and Ken is the third-born in his mother’s household.

He revealed that when his father fell seriously ill in 2006, most of his siblings had travelled to London for their studies, leaving him to shoulder much of the responsibility back home.

“My dad fell sick in 2006 when the twins were barely six years old, and everyone else was in London studying. So what happens? Who takes care of everyone at home? Me, Ken. I am the middle child who stayed home even when everyone travelled abroad to study. I remained home,” he said.

For the next six years, Mijungu became his father’s primary caregiver while balancing his own career and family responsibilities.

A Painful Hospital Ordeal

Mijungu also recounted the traumatic events leading up to his father’s death in 2012.

At the time, he was in Congo Brazzaville on assignment for CCTV Africa, covering a military explosion, when his father suffered a medical emergency back in Kenya.

His brother, Cliff, rushed their father—who had been partially paralysed—to a hospital in South B, hoping he would receive urgent treatment.

However, according to Mijungu, the hospital allegedly declined to admit him because the family could not immediately raise the required admission fees.

“They refused to take him to the ICU or HDU because we didn’t have the money to admit him to the hospital,” he recalled.

He said his father remained outside the hospital from around 6:00 p.m. until 2:00 a.m. before eventually being transferred to the High Dependency Unit (HDU) at Kenyatta National Hospital.

The Final Visit

After returning to Nairobi on a Saturday morning, Mijungu went straight from the airport to the hospital to see his father.

Although doctors informed him that his father could no longer speak or respond, they told him he was still able to hear those around him.

It would be the last time Mijungu saw his father alive—a moment he described as one that has remained deeply etched in his memory.

His emotional account offered listeners a glimpse into the personal struggles behind his successful media career, highlighting the sacrifices he made for his family during one of the most challenging periods of his life.