Families are mourning the deaths of their kin who were brutally killed during a fire incident at the famous Toi market on Saturday.
Margaret Atieno is still grappling with the loss of her firstborn, Kevin Ochieng. According to Margaret, the tragic event began around 5 am when she received a distress call about the fire and rushed to rescue her property.
Margaret's son, Ochieng, a 35-year-old headteacher, first checked on his mother's stall before heading to his wife's three stalls. At that point, the fire had not yet spread widely. However, panic ensued when Margaret was informed that Ochieng was missing and the fire had reached his wife's stalls.
During the frantic search, four bodies were discovered, not yet burnt beyond recognition. Margaret recounts, "I told my son to remove the iron sheets near the stall. As he finished, we found they were still burning and could be recognized. My son shouted, 'Here is Billy,' and I saw my son had been burnt."
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Shockingly, Ochieng was not alone; he was with his sister-in-law, Janet Kweyu, who had also rushed to save her sister's property. Both perished in the blaze. "When the bodies were removed, we found my son burnt and gone, and his sister-in-law also burnt and gone, along with two others we couldn't identify," says Margaret.
Ochieng's death is a severe blow to his younger sister, Pauline Atieno, who was set to join Kenya Medical Training College. She hoped her brother would fund her education. "If the firefighters had arrived earlier, my brother wouldn't have burnt. Billy wouldn't have burnt. Now, no one will pay my school fees because Billy had planned to," she laments.
The family faces a painful wait to bury their loved ones, as they need to provide DNA samples before the remains can be released. Meanwhile, some affected traders at Toi Market have begun reconstructing their stalls just a day after the inferno.
