It is believed that Angela Wangui and Abigael Mbaire, who were playing on their way home, wandered into a construction site and accidentally fell into a water-filled manhole that had been left unguarded.
“We had looked for the children everywhere and it took time before we knew where they were. A relative decided to check inside the construction site and it is then that their bodies were found floating on the water,” narrated the distraught father on Wednesday, August 12.
“Had the management guarded the holes, I would not have lost my two children that I dearly loved,” he lamented.
Residents in the area have since urged the government to take action against site management for what they termed as carelessness.
“Most of us are parents, we go to work and leave our children playing in the neighbourhood,” one resident explained.
The case came a month after a Chinese company was ordered to pay Ksh1 million to the family of a girl who fell into a manhole left unfilled by the company.
In the suit papers, it was indicated that the 13-year-old girl slipped and fell into the manhole that had been left open by the China National Aero-Technology International Engineering Corporation, a state-owned construction firm.
Health and safety guidelines for construction sites dictate that workers or those living around the area of a construction site be well sensitised and any manholes filled to prevent injury or loss of life.
Additionally, the law requires every construction site to have safety officers to identify risks posed by the project and mitigate them.
Source: KENYAGIST.COM
