The Local: Mutura should have a KEBS stamp

By Uncle Jeuri Tuesday, Jan 19th 2016 

One wag once joked that if there is any business you can start almost anyway in Kenya, and which will never collapse, then it is that of roasting mutura. 

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Another close friend of mine (who heavily feeds on mutura) once remarked that if at all Kenyans can be feeding on it without the approval from the Kenya Bureau of Standards (Kebs), then that is the only safe thing ever invented in Kenya, and which has been consumed without any ugly incidents being reported.

If you are new in town, then let me spare a minute or two and attempt to explain what this ‘delicacy’ that is mutura is.

I am not quite sure what makes it up, but what I know is that the intestines of some animal (I fear assuming that a cow’s is used. This is Kenya where somebody just wakes up in the morning and stuffs cat meat in samosas which he confidently parades as nyama ya ngombe, the cat in question being one of the stray ones in the neighbourhood). 


So, there we are. We have small and large intestines of some animal. In there is stuffed some things which vary from place to place. The sausage-like thing that is formed is then roasted over fire. Wananchi then mill around and buy, and this long sausage is cut into different sizes depending on the amount paid for it.

You may not know it, but this mutura is not a thing for the lowly. A man in a very expensive suit once sauntered into my local. We were wiling our evening away when he occupied the table next to ours, his iPhone in full display. After some shots of whisky, he ‘decided’ to throw up. What came out was what many eyes there believed was a liberal quantity of mutura! So this guy driving a Prado also fed on mutura?

I know it would be something akin to opening a can of a very bad variety of worms, should I suggest that as soon as the safety and standards regulator (Kebs) find time, then Kenyans should only eat mutura with the diamond mark of quality. Or worse, suggest that it finds its way to the supermarkets.

One thing that needs improvement in this mutura industry is how money and the meat are handled. You give your Sh20 which the seller puts in his pocket. The seller (and remember he has no gloves), uses the same hands to hold the mutura as he cuts you a piece. Another fellow comes along with a note and it’s the same thing all over again. By the end of the day, the seller has accumulated enough bacteria to cause a biological warfare!

We all love mutura, but that does not mean the entrepreneurs should sacrifice hygiene. So, something needs to be done before somebody decides that a Kebs stamp is a must, which will kill the entire mutura industry, whose stakeholders don’t even have an association.