The former boyfriend of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei, who killed her by setting her on fire, has himself died from burns sustained in the attack, a Kenyan hospital official has said.
Dickson Ndiema ambushed the marathon runner as she returned home from church more than a week ago. He then doused her with petrol and set her ablaze.
Local administrators said the two had been in conflict over a small piece of land in north-west Kenya, where Cheptegei lived and trained.
Ndiema died on Monday night at the intensive care unit, where according to the hospital, he had been admitted with burns on more than 40% of his body.
“He developed respiratory failure as a result of the severe airway burns and sepsis that led to his eventual death on Monday evening at 18:30 hours [15:30 GMT] despite life-saving measures,” a press release from Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital said.
Cheptegei died last Thursday – four days after she was attacked. She suffered burns to more than 80% of her body.
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Neighbours said that on the day of the attack, they heard screams before Cheptegei came running towards them shouting for help.
Local media reported that Ndiema had sneaked into Cheptegei’s home in western Kenya’s Trans Nzoia county with a five-litre jerrycan full of petrol.
Some of the fuel he poured on Cheptegei splashed onto his own body, according to reports. As a result, Ndiema got caught in the fire after he set his former partner alight.
Ndiema was to face charges as police said they were treating Cheptegei’s death as murder, with the former boyfriend named as the main suspect.
But now that Ndiema has died, the criminal case has been dropped and an inquest into the two deaths will be opened instead.
Both Ndiema and Cheptegei were admitted to Moi Hospital before their deaths.
Cheptegei’s death shocked people across the world, with fellow Ugandans saying she was an inspiration to them.
The 33-year-old Olympian was the third female athlete to be killed in Kenya over the last three years. In each case, current or former romantic partners were named as the main suspects by police.
In 2021, world-record holder Agnes Tirop was stabbed to death and six months later Damaris Mutua was strangled.
“I don’t wish bad things on anyone, but of course I would have loved for him to face the law as an example for others so that these attacks on women can stop,” Beatrice Ayikoru, secretary-general of the Uganda Olympic Committee, told the Reuters news agency.
Some observers are saying that female athletes are becoming increasingly vulnerable.
“[This is] because they go against traditional gender norms where the woman is just in the kitchen and just cooking and taking care of kids. But now female athletes are becoming more independent, financially independent,” Joan Chelimo, who co-founded Tirop’s Angels to help highlight the issue of violence against women.
Cheptegei was born on the Kenyan side of the Kenya-Uganda border, but chose to cross over and represent Uganda to chase her athletics dream when she did not get a breakthrough in Kenya.
When she first got into running, she joined the Uganda People’s Defence Forces in 2008 and rose to sergeant rank.
Her career included competing in this year’s Paris Olympics. Although she came 44th in the marathon, people in her home area called her “champion”.
She also won gold at the World Mountain and Trail Running Championships in Chiang Mai, Thailand, in 2022.
Cheptegei is set to be buried on Saturday at her ancestral home in Bukwo, Uganda.
Attacks on women have become a major concern in Kenya. In 2022 at least 34% of women said they had experienced physical violence, according to a national survey.
“We don’t want this to happen to any other woman, whether an athlete or from the village, or a young girl,” Rachel Kamweru, a spokesperson the the government’s department for gender and affirmative action, told the BBC.
