Building collapses in Kenyan capital, 15 missing

[June 13, 2017]  By Humphrey Malalo

NAIROBI (Reuters) - About 15 people were missing after a seven-storey building collapsed in a residential area of Nairobi, rescue services said on Tuesday, and the city's governor appealed to its owner to come forward and provide architectural plans to help rescuers.

Governor Evans Kidero, speaking at the scene of the collapse, said at least 30,000 to 40,000 buildings constructed without approval in the Kenyan capital were at risk.

Officials said the building's tenants had been asked to leave on Monday after residents reported cracks in the walls.

"People evacuated but we might have some people who might have been left behind," Pius Masai, deputy director of the National Disaster Management Unit, told Reuters at the site of Monday night's collapse.

Kenya has seen similar tragedies in the past. A total of 49 people died in the middle of last year when another building collapsed during a heavy, nighttime downpour in a poor neighborhood.

The government ordered the demolition of many other buildings after that incident.

"We hadn't got to a point where we were going to demolish it," governor Kidero said of the collapsed building which he confirmed had been listed for demolition.

Residents of the building said they had noticed cracks a week earlier and that they were plastered over with cement by its owners, before re-emerging again on Monday morning, prompting the call to leave.

POORER PARTS OF CITY

The advice to leave spared some who might have been trapped when the building came down in the evening.

"Some came from work late and tried to go in and collect their goods," said Dennis Mosoti, one of the building's tenants.

Emergency personnel work at the scene after a building collapsed in a residential area of Nairobi, Kenya June 13, 2017. REUTERS/Baz Ratner

Rescuers drawn from various government departments, including the youth service, dug through the rubble of the building with bare hands, pulling out personal items like broken beds, mattresses and television sets, after a specialist unit from the military cut through walls and floors at the top.

Distraught relatives stood nearby and watched. They included David Kisa, who said he got a call while at work on Monday night about the collapse. His wife and three children were still missing at lunchtime on Tuesday.

Most of the risky buildings are usually in the poorer sections of the city. Attempts to deal with the problem in the past have been stymied by owners of the buildings, who rush to court to stop demolition or other actions.

Kidero asked magistrates and judges to consider the human cost of unsafe buildings before issuing court orders against demolition.

"They should not come in our way because the result is what we have seen here," he said.

(Additional reporting by George Obulutsa and John Ndiso; Writing by Duncan Miriri; Editing by Ralph Boulton)

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