DEAR OPRAH WINFREY,

THIS E-MAIL WAS SENT TO YOU ON THE GIVEN DATE BUT THERE WAS NO REPLY. PLEASE REPLY

---

-- Original Message

---

--
From: Pastor P M Kihingu
To: Oprah Winfrey
Sent: Tuesday, November 15, 2005 5:18 PM
Subject: Introduction/Letter.

Dear Sir/Madame,

I dont know whether this letter is rightly addressed to you but i am praying that if not you would direct it to the attention of OPRAH WINFREY or someone who hundles OPRAH WINFREYS TV PRODUCTIONS or someone who can give it to her.I couldnt get her personal e-mail on the internnet.

I am writting this e-mail from Kenya East Africa to inquire whwther it is possible to appear in your programme "OPRAH" which i amd my family watch almost everyday here in Kenya East Africa.I have watched and seen you talk to many people in your programme who have had very interesting experiences in their lives and these have really been edifying,encouraging and uplifting to many people especially myself.I have watched people share chilling personal experiences about sexual abuse,rape, murder etc.Often they have talked about poverty, suffering, sicknesses, accidents, adventures etc. Many times i have had ecstatical laughter and tears in every programme i have watched, brought about by some of your guests whom inspite of their past experiences some of which were nasty could afford the boldness to talk about it and smile encouragngly to all of us.It takes suffering for one to fully know what it means to suffer and i am one of the few alive who has suffered.

This morning of the 15th November, after wrtting so many letters and sending them through my office computer, it struck me that though i have watched many people in your programme i have never seen any Kenyan appear in it and therefore reluctantly decided to write to you especially when i realized that in my short time on this planet earth and especially here in Kenya i am one person who has really gone through a lot of experiences and lived to tell my story.I dont know whether i would qualify to appear in your programme because that is at your prerogative but i certainly think i have something to share with your viewers about what it means to be a prisoner and a former prisoner in Kenya.Briefly this this is what i allegedly was and what i am today.

My full names are Pastor Peter Mosabi Kihingu.
I am a former member of the Kenya Armed forces. In 1980,while an active member of the Kenya Armed Forces, i was summarily arrested on suspicion that i was a foreign spy.I was interrogated and tortured and despite my protest to the contrary was found guilty and sentenced to a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison.

Six years and four months later i was prematurely released without the copmleation of the 14 years sentence, taken before the Director of CID who calmly looking at me in the face had announced.
"I am greatly sorry Private Kihingu that you had to go to prison and have been in prison for six years now for an offence it now very clear you never committed.I have personnaly taken time to re-investigated your case and found that someone made a very grave mistake of mistaken identnty.You shouldn't have gone to prison but somehow you did.I have talked to the President of The Republic of Kenya and he has ordered your immediate release.Now please go home and forget what happened to you.In fact count it as a bad dream and start again your life."

I did not and could not forget that i was in prison for six years and four months for nothing.I had demanded for restitution for the years i was in prison.I should have sought the services of a lawyer, but i had no money to pay for such services.Instead i had gone solo, demanding for the same at police and army headquaters and thus rubbed the wrong way my of my former antagonists.

Six months later i was back in custordy this time charged with 29 counts of robbery with violence.

On the 18thof November 1987,in broadaylight outside the Nairobi law courts fearing injustice for a second time, i escaped after grabbing a loaded rifle from an armed prison officer.

What followed was the most harrowing experience of my life.I was reapprehended one month later,shot in the right leg,sentenced to 134 years and sent back to prison again. This time with the longest sentence ever imposed on any one Kenyan citizen.

Twice i attempted suicide and failled thwarted by prison officers whom i believed were part of my enemies.But after all this something happened to me in 1987 when a fellow inmate talked to me about God and demonstrated to me what a fool i was thinking i could fight a system like the Kenya Government and win.Meeting that prisoner changed my life.Because through the word of God he made me see myself for whom i really was-a proud,egocentric former military soldier wronged all right but using all the wrong methods to fight an establishment.

One year later i was released from prison on the 1st of June,1993.
Today am the founder of The Ex-prisoners Rehabilitation Socierty,The founder of Good News Missions Community Church and the National Director Of Good News Jail & Prison Ministry in Kenya ministering to many inmates in the same prison facilities where i was once incarcerated.I am married with two children.

I would like to share with you and your viewers my experiences as a former prisoner and what God has done in my life if that can assist other people whom perhaps have had simmiler experiences and dont know what to do.

Recently in June this year i was invited to the USA by Dr Harry Fletcher,Vice President Good News Jail & Prison Ministry and managed to talk to inmates at Chesterfield country Jail in Richmond Virginia and i can tell you it was a reall experience i had compared to our prisons in Kenya.

My only question is would you invite me.

May God Bless You and tourch you to do so.

I know you are not obligated to answer this letter since i am a stranger to you but please send me word even if this is not possible, it would be very encouraging to hear from you.

Pastor Peter Mosabi Kihingu.
Good News Mission Community Church
Kenya-East Africa.