Lovingly known as “Hon. Mburu”
14 September 1969 — 12 December 2025 · aged 56
Ol Kalou MCA who tarmacked the road to market and still attended every funeral
Ol Kalou, Kenya Born in Ol Kalou, Nyandarua County Resting at Family home, Ol KalouIt is with profound sorrow that we announce the passing of Hon. PETER MBURU KARANJA, Member of the County Assembly for Ol Kalou Ward, on 12th December 2025 at Nyahururu County Referral Hospital. Husband to Jane Wanjiru; father to Kevin and Lilian; brother to Samuel and many; son of the late Mzee Karanja. Family and friends meet daily at Ol Kalou at 5.00 pm. Cortege leaves Nyahururu Funeral Home on Friday 19th December at 7.30 am for a funeral service at PCEA Ol Kalou Parish, followed by burial at the family home. M-Pesa Paybill 745190, Account MBURU. Rest in peace, Honourable.
Honourable Peter Mburu Karanja kept a small notebook in which he wrote the name of every funeral he attended, and by the time he died it held more than eleven hundred entries. It is the kind of detail that explains why Ol Kalou ward re-elected him twice by landslides: when his constituents mourned, he turned up, sat on a plastic chair and stayed to the end.
He was born in Ol Kalou in 1969, the first son of a potato farmer, and studied at Mahiga Secondary, where he was the school's best debater. He trained as a quantity surveyor at Kenya Polytechnic and worked for a Nakuru roads contractor for ten years before returning home to run a small hardware and agrovet business. His neighbours say that is where he learnt politics: by listening to farmers argue over the price of seed.
He was first elected Member of the County Assembly for Ol Kalou Ward in 2013. In three terms he championed the tarmacking of the road from Ol Kalou to the Njabini market, a cold-storage shed for potato farmers, and bursaries for more than two thousand students. He was known for turning up in gumboots, for refusing a government driver and for answering his own phone at midnight.
Outside politics he sang tenor in the PCEA Ol Kalou choir, coached an under-fourteen football team and loved boiled arrowroots with fresh milk. His children say he had one rule at home: no politics at the dinner table before the second helping.
He died at Nyahururu County Referral Hospital on 12 December 2025 after a short illness, aged fifty-six.
He leaves his wife Jane, two children, his brothers and sisters and a ward that is still learning how to say goodbye.
“A leader who skips funerals has not understood the job.”
Friday, 19 December 2025 at 07:00 UTC
Add to calendarComing together to honour Peter and support the family.
Funeral arrangements and the memorial bursary.
Annual remembrance at the family home each December
Contact: Samuel Maina Karanja
$47.50 raised through this committee
No fundraising target set.
Residents and farmers contributing for the funeral and bursary.
Ol Kalou Social Hall, Thursdays 3.00 pm
Contact: Mzee Joseph Gathogo
$147.25 raised of $3,100.78
Fellow members contributing and arranging a guard of honour.
County Assembly chambers, Tuesdays 1.00 pm
Contact: Hon. Margaret Wanjiku Kimani
$109.25 raised of $3,875.97
Funeral service programme and music.
Church hall, Wednesdays 6.00 pm
Contact: Rev. Joseph Kamau Ndiritu
$156.75 raised of $775.19
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Memorial fund
Support the funeral and continue the Ol Kalou Ward bursary for needy students in his name.
$674.50 raised of $7,000
10%17 recent contributions
Peter Kiprotich gave $95 · 21h ago
Collins Kibet Rono gave $47.50 · 3w ago
Anonymous gave $47.50 · 3w ago
Mary Wafula gave $14.25 · 1mo ago
“From your old classmates.”
Anonymous gave $47.50 · 1mo ago
Secondary education
Mahiga Secondary School1983 – 1986 · Nyandarua
Best debater in the school and head of the Young Farmers Club.
Diploma in Quantity Surveying
Kenya Polytechnic1988 – 1991 · Nairobi
Qualified to supervise building and roads projects.
Quantity surveyor, then shop owner
Nakuru roads contractor; Karanja Agrovet1992 – 2012 · Nakuru and Ol Kalou
Worked on roads before opening a hardware and agrovet shop at Ol Kalou.
Member of the County Assembly
Nyandarua County Assembly2013 – 2025 · Ol Kalou
Served three terms for Ol Kalou Ward.
Married Jane Wanjiru
1996 · Ol Kalou
A marriage of twenty-nine years.
County Service Excellence Award
Nyandarua County Government2021 · Ol Kalou
For infrastructure and education bursary programmes.
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Peter is survived by
6 people have shared a memory of Peter.
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Sign in to write a tributeSon
Dad, your notebook of funerals is in my pocket. I will continue it, one chair at a time. Thank you for teaching me to show up.
Cousin in Atlanta
Cousin Peter sent me a text every Christmas asking if I was eating well. He was running a county and still remembering my birthday. Come home soon, I told him. Now it is I who must come.
Minister, PCEA Ol Kalou
His tenor voice rang the loudest in our choir, and he gave offering quietly each month without a camera in sight. We thank God for a servant who led with humility.
Bursary beneficiary, now teacher
Hon. Mburu paid my first year at Egerton from his own pocket when the bursary was late. I am now a mathematics teacher at Ol Kalou Girls. Every child I teach carries his kindness forward.
Potato farmer, Ol Kalou
The cold-storage shed he built has saved my harvest three seasons in a row. I never voted for him because of what he promised, only because of what he did. Rest well, Honourable.
Fellow MCA, Nyandarua County Assembly
Mburu never missed a sitting and never missed a funeral. He once drove three hours to the burial of a voter whose name he barely knew. That is what leadership meant to him.
