Olympic runner Cheptegei defied her violent ex. She lost her life anyway

By Ammu Kannampilly

KINYORO, Kenya (Reuters) -On the morning of Sunday Sept. 1, Olympic marathon runner Rebecca Cheptegei was preparing to go to church from her home in the highlands of western Kenya. Her ex-boyfriend called a friend of his to ask if he could borrow a lighter.

He said he had "an emergency" and was heading out of town, the friend, retired runner Dennis Masai Chepkongin, told Reuters at his home in the Mount Elgon region, where Cheptegei lived.

"He became very secretive when I asked him why," Chepkongin said, adding that he declined the request.

Hours later Cheptegei's former boyfriend, Dickson Ndiema Marangach, doused the runner in petrol and set her on fire, according to her family and police. 

Both would die in hospital of their burns. Marangach could not be reached for comment before his death, and Reuters was unable independently to verify the details of what happened that day. 

A police official, who asked not to be named because they were not authorised to speak to the media, confirmed Marangach had been under investigation for murder when he died.

The land around Cheptegei's home in the quiet village of Kinyoro bore witness to a grisly death. The ground was charred and moist with gasoline when reporters visited last weekend. Her 17-year-old sister, Dorcas, who was attacked with a machete, sat weeping quietly, her body doubled over, or stared dumbly into space.

Cheptegei's killing so soon after the athlete had competed for Uganda in the Paris Olympics shocked the world. But it was no surprise to Cheptegei or her family, her parents told Reuters. 

Their story sheds light on the dark side of success for female athletes in Kenya's patriarchal society. Elite runners can earn more money in a single marathon than many Kenyans do in a year. They say their success frequently makes them targets for predatory men who try to manipulate them and wrest control of their assets.

Cheptegei was the third female runner to be killed in Kenya since 2021, allegedly by romantic partners. Her funeral took place on Saturday in neighbouring Uganda's Bukwo district with full military honours, as the athlete was a member of the Ugandan defence forces. 

Cheptegei had tried to protect herself. 

A 33-year-old single mother of two born in Uganda, she had walked out of the relationship with Marangach, managed her own money and was breadwinner for an extended family including her parents, a dozen siblings and her two daughters, aged 9 and 11, family members said.

She had gone to police at least three times this year to report threats and physical abuse by Marangach, her father, Joseph, said.

He shared with Reuters police slips confirming complaints she filed in February and May, in Kinyoro and the nearby town of Kitale.

"This man is going to kill my child," Joseph said he told officers in February, after Marangach allegedly beat her up and broke her phone.

He said the police had told Marangach to stay away from Cheptegei's home, but he didn't listen. "So we went back to the police and they were not keen to do anything else. My daughter died because the police failed."

Neither the local nor the national police responded to a request for comment on that point. Government spokesman Isaac Mwaura did not respond to Reuters' questions.

Cheptegei's killing left other female runners despairing at what they called the continuing inaction of the authorities and Athletics Kenya, the national governing body for the sport.  

"No one is held accountable," said Joan Chelimo, who co-founded Tirop's Angels, a non-profit established to support domestic violence victims after Kenyan long-distance runner Agnes Tirop was stabbed to death in 2021.

Tirop's husband, Ibrahim Rotich, was charged with her murder. He pleaded not guilty and was released on bail last year. His case is ongoing and his lawyer declined to comment.

Kenyan-Bahraini runner Damaris Mutua was also killed in 2022. Her Ethiopian boyfriend was named as a suspect. The Kenyan police say he fled Kenya.

Kenya's Sports Minister Kipchumba Murkomen has condemned the attack on Cheptegei and promised action.

An adviser to President William Ruto said authorities were working to prevent gender-based violence in sports. But activists say its efforts are falling short.

"A STRAIGHTFORWARD PERSON"

Violence against women is a major problem in Kenya. One in three adolescent girls and women have been victims, according to government data from 2022.

Femicide Count Kenya, an NGO that uses media reports to document intentional killings with a gender-related motivation, has recorded 157 killings of women so far in 2024 -- the most in a year since it began collecting data in 2019.

"More women are facing violence but they are not getting any help from police," said Audrey Mugeni, the group's co-founder.

Elizabeth Keitany, who sits on the executive board of Athletics Kenya, said her team had helped six young women escape abusive relationships since 2022, offering them a safe place to live and counselling services.

"Any case that is reported to us, we are very swift," she told Reuters. 

Esther Chemtai, a 24-year-old fellow athlete of Cheptegei's, said that when she was 18, she had also been in an abusive relationship with a man who wanted her to hand over all her earnings to him. When she refused, he beat her.

Chemtai left him in January 2023, with the help of Tirop's Angels, who offered her support and counselling, she said.

Chemtai called Cheptegei a "straightforward person" who did not hesitate to walk away from controlling men.

"If she said no, it meant no," Chemtai said.

Cheptegei was also devoted to her family, buying land for her father worth $1,200 in 2016 -- the equivalent of around 11 months of Kenya's minimum wage at the time.

She met Marangach, a struggling motorcycle taxi driver and aspiring athlete, in 2020 or 2021 when she was living in Uganda, her family said. Marangach urged her to move to Kenya and train in Iten, a hub for top distance runners and a high-altitude training attraction for tourists.

She built a house just over two hours' drive from Iten in Kinyoro and moved there in 2021, according to the retired runner Chepkongin. A former world U20 champion, he said he met her around that time.    

The home is a two-bedroom house on a small plot of land in a quiet community with little infrastructure. Roads are unpaved and potholed, access to electricity is limited -- on a clear night, the Milky Way is visible -- but the proximity to Iten was good for training.

The police official said Marangach was in possession of a deed to that land. Cheptegei's father rejects this claim. He showed Reuters a photo of a land deed signed and stamped in March 2021, which listed Rebecca as the purchaser of the plot in Kinyoro, and Marangach as a witness.

Her family and Chepkongin say Cheptegei supported Marangach financially. The retired runner said he had been friends with Marangach since 2018 and had also helped cover his rent, training kit and other expenses.

"Dickson had no money before Rebecca came into his life," he said.

Two of Marangach's sisters told Reuters his family was indeed poor. But his elder sister, Naomi Chebet Kiprop, said the couple had pooled funds to buy the land where Cheptegei lived with her daughters.

"God would have helped Dickson get a place we can call home," she told Reuters. 

"Now that Dickson has died, we have no means."

"EVERYONE DEPENDED ON HER" 

Cheptegei ended the relationship with Marangach in January, her father said. In May, she reported Marangach to the police after he sent men to try to intimidate her into handing over her land and house.

Chepkongin and Samwel Kibet, another friend of Marangach, said he did not heed their advice to leave Cheptegei alone.

Cheptegei went to the police again on Friday, Aug. 30. The officers told her to return the following Monday, according to her father, who was with her, and Chepkongin. 

The local police official said officers saw the problem as a conflict about land after the relationship soured, adding that police thought they had "made peace" between the two.  

With Cheptegei and her family at church that Sunday morning, Marangach climbed over her land's barbed wire wall and hid inside the chicken coop until she returned, her father said, citing an account by her sister Dorcas.

Marangach attacked Rebecca and lunged at Dorcas with a machete when she tried to intervene, Joseph Cheptegei said. 

Dorcas did not speak to Reuters about the attack, but she stressed her sister's drive to survive. 

"My sister always told me it was very important for a woman to have her own money, to be empowered, not depend on anyone," she said. 

Cheptegei suffered burns to 80% of her body. When she was hospitalised, her father said he could only recognise her voice. She died four days later.

For Cheptegei's family, in mourning at their homestead an hour's drive from Rebecca's home, anger was matched by the depth of their loss.

"Everyone in this compound depended on her. I don't know what I will do now," her mother Agnes said, breaking down in tears.

(Reporting by Ammu Kannampilly in Kinyoro, Kitale, Endebess, Iten, Eldoret and Nairobi, additional reporting by John Wanyama in Moiben and Vivianne Wandera in Nairobi; Editing by Aaron Ross and Sara Ledwith)