Bondo: Bodies of the three artisanal miners who were buried alive at a goldmine in Ogago village in Bondo on Friday evening have all been retrieved. The recovery of the body of Erick Okode on Sunday evening marked the end of the 48-hour recovery operation that was spearheaded by a local rescue team. Okode died in the ill-fated gold mine alongside his elder brother Amos Okode whose body was retrieved from the mine at around 1pm on Sunday. A third victim of the fateful incident was Brandon Juma whose body was the first to be recovered on Saturday night inside the 50-feet deep gold mine.

According to Kenya News Agency, the trio were among twelve artisanal miners who had gone out for their routine mining activities when the mining shaft collapsed and buried them alive on Friday. For two days after the incident, search and rescue efforts involved local volunteers and authorities working tirelessly to recover the bodies. The bodies have been moved to Bondo hospital mortuary with area Member of County Assembly (MCA) Oliver Arika calling on the county administration to revamp its emergency response department to minimise loss of lives during disasters.

'We have had far too many tragedies in the county yet the emergency response by the county government has been very poor. There have been a number of fire outbreaks, boats capsizing and a goldmine collapsing but the county government has no response mechanism that can rescue its people who pay taxes. When we complain as Members of County Assembly, we are perceived to be politicking. This must come to an end to avoid loss of lives,' said Arika.

Bondo Sub-county administrator Mr Vincent Kanyang'onda who visited the scene of the accident however defended the executive saying the county has a robust emergency response mechanism but blamed lack of prompt communication from disaster scenes to trigger the response. 'I understand this incident happened on Friday evening but the county government only learnt about it on Saturday morning this is what delayed our response,' said Kanyang'onda.