By Betty Luke
Property of an unknown amount has been destroyed after fire broke out at a dormitory in Isiolo Girls High School on Saturday evening.
School staff and members of the public who rushed to the school immediately after the incident was reported around 8pm helped put out the fire as the county fire as they waited for the county fire engine to arrive.
Thirty minutes later, dozens of terrified parents could be seen moving up and down in the dark school compound in search of their daughters.
Some could be heard making calls ostensibly to establish if their daughters could have sneaked out of the school and proceeded to their homes.
As of 9pm the school management had started taking records of girls who were present at the school in efforts to establish of there were any missing girls.
Parents who spoke to us on condition of anonymity decried what they termed as negligence by the County fire department and security actors.
“I have been here for nearly an hour but the fire engine hasn’t arrived yet. Police officers should have been here to control who is getting in and out of the school for the safety of the girls,” one of them said.
By the time of going to press we had not acertained the extent of destruction and if there were any missing girls even as some of the teachers we spoke to assured us that no student had been hurt.
A local leader Lucy Mworia called on the security agencies to expedite investigations into the incident to establish the cause of the fire.
“I am shocked to learn of the incident which comes a day after we lost more than 20 pupils at Hillside Endarasha in Nyeri. I call on the Ministry of Education to fully implement safety measures in schools to avert loss of lives and destruction of property,”said Mworia.
