The Sammy Lui I knew

The news of the sudden death of  veteran broadcaster, Sammy Lui immediately reminded me of the recent sad TV image of an agonising and exasperated Lui with both his hands raised towards Mt Kenya as he stood on the ruins of his Woodley Estate House after it was demolished by the Nairobi County Government together with several others really made me extremely sad when I recalled how the highly talented late broadcaster had served the powers that be for decades with total dedication, devotion and commitment.

I had the privilege of working very closely with the late broadcasting giant at KBC, me being a news editor and him being a newscaster in the late 90s and early 20s.

But it is during the period between and before the historic 2002 general election when a combined opposition brought to an end the monolithic Kanu party rule, that the two of us became extremely close though each one of us was at the time on the opposing side and we were therefore pulling in different directions.

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And when the votes were tallied after the polls, his preferred presidential candidate won with a landslide beating my candidate hands down. Consequently, the incoming new administration went on to hand him a key position in the Presidential Press Service.

The reason why he did not support the then system candidate and chose to support the opposition candidate despite working for the same system is rather an interesting one and a story for another day.

Lest I digress, the Sammy Lui I knew was a soft spoken man of a quiet disposition but a highly dignified and respectable person.

Though a highly knowledgeable and experienced broadcaster, he would calmly consult with the young editors on duty, whenever he felt that a news story in the news bulletin he was going to present was not making a lot of sense.

It is worthy to note that most of KBC news editors together with both Radio and TV Producers at KBC back then and who worked closely with the late Lui were young enough to be his children and we therefore had to learn how to respectfully deal with the highly talented broadcast journalist, but a man of a few words at least when away from the mic.

For this reason, therefore, most of us kept a respectable distance between him and ourselves. For some strange reason however, the man with a golden voice had a soft spot for me and therefore the two of us had a very good working chemistry.

I guess it is probably because both of us originally hailed from the same county of Nyeri, me from Mukurwe-ini constituency and him from the neighbouring Mathira constituency.

The fallen broadcasting legend had also an intriguing and mysterious side to his personality.

In fact, his real name is said to be Samuel Warui Wang’ondu which he seemingly coined to read Sammy Lui.

Go well my old friend and colleague, Sammy Lui.

You belong to the league of extraordinary broadcasters who went before you; among them the late Salim Mohamed, the late Salim Juma, the late Daniel Gatei and the late Leonard Mambo Mbotela.

You have left an indelible mark in the country’s broadcasting history.

Fare-thee-well Sammy Lui …

The writer is a former News Editor at KBC

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