This archive report was first published on 7 October 2019.
Twenty-five years have passed since the Mtongwe ferry disaster, which claimed over 200 lives, just metres from the Kenya Navy headquarters. The recent Likoni Channel incident shows how few lessons have been learned from this tragedy, with government agencies scrambling to find the correct equipment and staff for the rescue mission, even days later.
As I write this, the bodies of Mariam Kighenda and her four-year-old daughter are yet to be retrieved from the seabed. This incident is a stark reminder of the need for Kenya to take citizen safety more seriously.
Two weeks before the Likoni accident, a storied classroom block at a private school collapsed in Dagoretti, Nairobi, killing eight children. We are accustomed to such chilling deaths, and disturbingly, accept negligence as part of our genes.
The government took four days to set up a rescue team, led by a Ministry of Transport Principal Secretary. To do what exactly? Rescue and emergency plans should have been part and parcel of governance since independence.
Kenya has become immune to man-made disasters, from road accidents to buildings collapsing and slums burning. Corruption is always in the mix of such disasters. The Kenya Ferry Services (KFS), in charge of the Likoni ferry, has itself been implicated in corruption, with the Auditor-General's report claiming that KFS failed to account for Sh5.4 billion.
It is hypocritical of us to appear surprised by avoidable deaths when we sit back and let corrupt officials reign in public offices. So long as we continue with our corrupt ways of working and trading, we will suffer heavy human and financial losses.
The school collapse claimed a few scalps in Nairobi, with the owner of the school arrested days after the incident. However, what we haven't heard is reassurance that concrete measures were being taken to avoid a repeat of such cases.
A lot of blame game follows disasters, and we rarely see senior officials taken to task or even taking responsibility for systemic failures in their departments or ministries. The buck does, and always must, stop at the very top.
