Kenya school fire: Prosecutor directs police to investigate cause of blaze

Director of Public Prosecutions Renson Ingonga said the tragedy “evokes bad memories of other similar school fire incidents” that many times pointed to negligence and failure to comply with safety standards.

Any person found culpable would be quickly taken through the due process of criminal trial, he added in a statement on X, external.

Kenya’s national gender and equality commission said in a statement, external that initial reports indicating the dormitory was overcrowded were “deeply concerning”.

The fire broke out in the dormitory housing 156 boys in the remote area in Nyeri county around 23:00 local time on Thursday. Firefighters were delayed by bad roads, but people living nearby rushed to rescue the boys.

It “is a catastrophe beyond our imagination”, government spokesman Isaac Mwaura said at the school on Saturday. “It is truly devastating for the nation to lose such a number of young and promising Kenyans. Our hearts are heavy.”

Around 50 children are unaccounted for – some thought to have escaped into the local community or been picked up by their parents without the school’s knowledge.

Mr Mwaura said on Saturday that more than 20 children had now been accounted for, after 70 were initially reported missing on Friday. He urged the media to not “rush to make conclusions about the numbers” as DNA testing would take days.

On Saturday, criminal investigators and government pathologists had sealed off the site for analysis. Identification of the bodies would not take place until Monday at a hospital, another official told journalists.

“Some of the bodies were burnt beyond repair,” the official said.

That means parents, desperate for news, could have to wait two more days before knowing the fate of their children.

President William Ruto has declared a three-day national mourning period to start on Monday.