By Elias Biryabarema and Ammu Kannampilly
KAMPALA (Reuters) – Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei, who was allegedly doused in gasoline and set on fire by her ex-partner, was buried with full military honors at her ancestral home in northeastern Uganda on Saturday.
Cheptegei, 33, returned to his home in mountainous western Kenya, popular with international runners for its high-altitude training opportunities, after finishing 44th in the marathon at the Paris Olympics on August 11.
This would be his last race.
Three weeks later, her ex-boyfriend, Dixon Ndiema Marangach, along with her two daughters and younger sister, attacked Cheptegei as she was returning from church in Kinyoro village, accompanied by Kenyan police and her family.
Her father, Joseph Cheptegei, told Reuters that his daughter had gone to the police at least three times to report Marangac, most recently on August 30, two days before her ex-partner’s alleged attack.
He burned 80% of his body and died from his injuries 4 days later.
“I don’t think I’m going to make it,” she told her father while being treated at the hospital.
“If I die, bury me in a house in Uganda.”
Hundreds of mourners, including Olympians from Uganda and Kenya, gathered for his funeral in Bukwo, in northeastern Uganda, near the border with Kenya.
She was lovingly eulogized in speeches as a hero, mother and sister, and her body was later lowered into her grave shortly after 5:00 pm (1200 GMT).
He was buried with full military honors, including a gun salute, by the Ugandan military of which he was a member.
“He embodied an admirable spirit of resilience, dedication, generosity and hard work that worked together to catapult him to international fame,” Kenya’s sports minister Kipchumba Murkomen said in eulogizing the athlete.
His death marked “the tragic end of a blossoming life,” he said.
FEMALE ATHLETES ARE AT RISK
Cheptegei’s death sparked outrage over the high level of violence against women in Kenya, particularly in the athletics community, and the marathoner became the third elite runner since 2021 to die allegedly at the hands of a romantic partner.
According to government data for 2022, one in three Kenyan girls or women aged 15-49 have experienced physical violence.
Rights groups say female athletes in Kenya are at high risk of exploitation and abuse by men attracted to their prize money, which far exceeds local earnings.
Cheptegei’s sporting achievements include winning the 2021 World Mountain and Trail Running Championships in Thailand and a year later finishing first in the Padova Marathon in Italy and setting a national marathon record.
Born in eastern Uganda in 1991, he met Marangach during a training trip to Kenya before moving to the country to pursue his dream of becoming an elite runner.
Marangach died a few days after Cheptegei from burns suffered in the attack, which divided opinion among the local running community.
“Justice would really be for him to sit in jail and think about what he’s done,” said marathon runner Viola Cheptoo, co-founder of Tirop’s Angels, a group that supports athletes facing domestic violence in Kenya.
The circumstances of Cheptegei’s death shocked the world, but his name may still inspire future athletes, with the French capital planning to name a sports facility in his honor.
“She dazzled us here in Paris. We saw her. Her beauty, strength, freedom,” the city’s mayor Anne Hidalgo told reporters. “Paris will not forget him.”
