Pardoned Ex-Convict Narrates Seeing Nairobi for First Time After 42 Years Behind Bars

On Jamhuri day, President Uhuru Kenyatta pardoned 48 long serving inmates. Among them was 75 year old James Weru Mureithi, who had been locked up in Kamiti Maximum Security Prison for more than four decades.
Now a free man, Mr James Weru was taken on a tour of the Capital and as expected, it was an intriguing, mind blowing and shocking experience for him, having been locked up for 42 years.
When Weru was imprisoned in 1974, Jomo Kenyatta was the president of Kenya. A loaf of bread cost 75 cents, bag of fries cost Sh2 and a soda would set him back 50 cents.
In a interview with Citizen, Weru expressed shock over the Ksh 100 asking price of chips.
“Just the other day we went to have soda at a shopping center and I must admit I was quite surprised with one soda costing Sh100,” said Weru.
“Another thing that amazed me was chips that cost Sh100 yet in my days I would buy at Sh2,” He added.
As you can imagine, technology too is new to him and he was taken aback by the advent of smartphones and tablets.
Mr Weru was also amazed by the tremendous development he witnessed.
Watch his story below. Video courtesy of Citizen