A somber mood has engulfed Bushibo B village in Butsotso Central Ward, Lurambi Constituency, Kakamega County, after twin siblings—a boy and a girl aged two and a half years—were burned to death in their home.
According to Eugene Menny, a brother to the twins, he was entrusted with their care by his father, Geoffrey Menny, as he headed to church. Eugene says he left the children, Fiel Munyanya and Idel Okolla, playing outside as he went to fetch water from a nearby river. Upon his return, he found the house engulfed in flames. Despite his efforts to locate the children, he discovered they had already perished in the fire.
“I was left with the children by my father. I went down the road briefly and saw smoke—our house was on fire,” recounted Eugene Menny.
He added that he could not determine the cause of the fire, as the house was not connected to electricity, and the gas cylinder in the house did not contain any gas at the time.
Neighbors, led by Phelistus Shimuli, expressed their shock at the incident, noting that it occurred just two days after the children’s mother returned to college, leaving the children in the care of their father.
“The children’s father was with us at church when he received a call that his house was on fire. The mother had gone back to college just two days ago. The children didn’t live here permanently; their father was planning to take them to their grandmother’s home,” explained Shimuli.
Another neighbor, Alex Amaya, described the efforts to rescue the children:
“We rushed to try and save the children. We broke through the wall and started fetching water to extinguish the fire, but unfortunately, the children had already been badly burned. They were lifeless by the time we got to them. Nothing was salvaged from the house; everything was destroyed in the fire.”
The bodies of the two children have been taken to the Kakamega County Referral Hospital mortuary as police launch investigations to establish the cause of the fire.
