Joseph Mathenge | NATION Survivors of the 1998 bomb attack on the US embassy in Nairobi mark the 13th anniversary at the memorial park on August 07, 2011.
By AGGREY MUTAMBO amutambo@ke.nationmedia.com
Posted Sunday, August 7 2011 at 22:00
Posted Sunday, August 7 2011 at 22:00
Tens of survivors of the 1998 bomb attack on the American embassy in Nairobi marked the 13th anniversary of the black day with prayer and tears.
Some broke down as they lay flowers at the scene in memory of those who died. Others told the stories they have repeated many times, about the horrible day.
Mr Boniface Mutua, 62, was a passerby on Haile Selasie Avenue when falling glasses and pieces of metal hit him, causing serious head damage.
“Although I was treated, I still experience loss of memory which meant that I could not work properly as an investigator and litigation officer which demands your memory to be intact,” he said.
That was not all. Mr Mutua said he lost his manhood and the trauma is still with him.
Mr Mutua is one of the people who survived the bomb but have had to live with more traumas. At the memorial site yesterday, those who turned said they had not received direct support from either the Kenyan of US governments.
But Mutua said his children were educated up to Form Four, from the funds sent from the American governments.
“Personally, I never got any financial support but my children received scholarships from the US.”
However, he could not send all of them to college because he didn’t have enough money.
“They said they could not pay beyond secondary school, so the burden still came back to me.”
Hundreds of people were killed and thousands wounded when bombs exploded simultaneously at US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam.
The attack in Kenya was more severe, killing 212 people, among them 12 Americans working at the embassy.
In Tanzania, 11 people died and 85 were injured.
The American government announced that it had contributed $42 million (about Sh3.7 billion) towards health care for injured victims, building reconstruction, and business recover.
In May this year, the then US Ambassador to Kenya Michael Ranneberger said it was difficult to adequately compensate for the deaths and injuries.
“We tried to be responsive to the victims. But in a situation like that, you can never do enough, to be quite frank about it. And I think the victims deserve all the respect and assistance that they can possibly get,” he said.
“We tried to be responsive to the victims. But in a situation like that, you can never do enough, to be quite frank about it. And I think the victims deserve all the respect and assistance that they can possibly get,” he said.
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