Fresh details emerge of slain Ugandan athlete Rebecca Cheptegei's alleged lover

Following a tragic turn of events that led to the death of Ugandan athlete Rebecca Cheptegei, her father Joseph has come out to clear the air noting that the alleged killer Dickson Ndiema Marangach is not the Olympian lover.

According to her father Joseph Cheptegei, Marangach was not his daughter’s husband. He insisted that his daughter’s husband lived in Uganda and Marangach and Cheptegei were just friends.

"I wish to state that my wounded daughter is married and her husband is in Uganda. Her attacker was a friend they met in Kenya and my daughter trusted him.

They fell out recently but the suspect sneaked into her compound on Sunday afternoon, armed with five litres of petrol and hid in a poultry house,” the father said.

“She was a good child, very polite, and did not have issues with people. I blame the government for her death.” These were the heavy words of Agnes Cheptegei, the mother of slain Ugandan athlete Rebecca Cheptegei.

The distraught mother was deeply saddened that despite their relentless efforts to seek justice and report the alleged perpetrator to the authorities multiple times, no action was taken by the government.

She revealed that the perpetrator has been incessantly following her daughter, even crossing borders to Uganda in pursuit of her.

Disturbed by his actions, they decided to report him, hoping for intervention in vain.

Cheptegei suffered burns over more than 80 per cent of her body after a man, referred to by authorities as her alleged boyfriend, doused her with gasoline and set her on fire at her home in Trans-Nzoia County on Sunday 1 September.

Dickson Ndiema Marangach, the alleged perpetrator, also suffered serious burns and they were both being treated at Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital in Eldoret.

What the police said

Trans-Nzoia County Police Commander Jeremiah Ole Kosiom said that Marangach snuck into Cheptegei's home at around 2 PM on Sunday 1 September while she and her children were in church. He is said to have hidden petrol in a poultry house which he used to commit the crime.

The commander also said Cheptegei and Marangach had been involved in a protracted land dispute that was headed to court. They were known to have argued about it before.

Investigators found an empty gas can and a fire-damaged mobile phone they believe belonged to Cheptegei.

Her children are currently being cared for by their grandmother.

Cheptegei's biography

Cheptegei was born on 22 February 1991 and grew up in Cheminy, Uganda.

She was one of the athletes who represented Uganda in the recently concluded Paris 2024 Olympics. That was her Olympic debut and she finished in position 44 (of 91 runners, 11 of whom did not finish) in the women's marathon with a time of 2:32:14.

Before the Olympics, she had been competing professionally in distance races since 2010.

Paris Olympian fighting for life in Eldoret after allegedly being set ablaze by lover

According to World Athletics, her first listed result was a 4-minute, 20.49-second 15th-place finish in the 1,500-meters at the 38th IAAF World Cross Country Championships in 2010 in Poland.

In 2022, she won the Padova Marathon in Italy and finished second in the 10,000 meters at the Ugandan Championships, as well as triumphing in the women's up-and-down mountain race at the inaugural World Mountain and Trail Running Championships in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

She capped off that year finishing in fourth place in the 2022 ADNOC Abu Dhabi Marathon with a personal best time of 2:22:47.

Cheptegei finished 14th in the marathon at the 2023 World Athletics Championships in Budapest last summer and was one of 25 athletes who qualified to represent Uganda at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

She is a mother of two children; a nine-year-old and an 11-year-old.