Evans Kiratu's family demands apology, damages from state

Emotions ran high during the burial of 21-year-old Evans Kiratu Karobia who died during the anti-Finance Bill protests in Nairobi last week.

Kiratu succumbed to injuries after he was hit by a teargas canister.

He was buried on Friday with the family calling for a public apology and compensation from President William Ruto.

The burial ceremony was conducted in Karambaini village in Kiambu town.

No political leader or government official attended the burial.

Kiratu was a trained plumber. His 161-word eulogy indicated that his demise was due to an accident during 'mandamano' in Nairobi.

Chris Munene, the Good Samaritan who rushed Kiratu to Kenyatta National Hospital for treatment gave an account of what happened.

He said the incident happened at around 630pm between Haile Sellassie Avenue and Tom Mboya street as protestors were leaving CBD.

He said teargas was thrown to where they were and a man was down on the road.

"We were leaving the protest and all of a sudden, a teargas was thrown into the crowd and it hit a man and we rushed to help the man who was writhing in pain," Munene said.

He said the man who he did not know was crying and saying his private parts were gone.

Munene said at the hospital, there were other injured persons and so it took a long time for the medical personnel to attend to him.

He said the delay prompted him to record the whole scenario on his phone and that's when medical help was given.

"I asked the man what his name was but he was not able to speak properly as he was vomiting blood and kept on giving me half the number of a contact person as he complained about his groin," he said.

Munene said he searched him and found only a pocket radio on him.

He said he left Kiratu in the hospital while being attended to at around 12 midnight.

The next day upon following up, he was informed by the medical personnel that the patient passed on.

"I could not believe that the young man was dead since I left him alive being attended to by doctors. I asked to see the body and I confirmed it was the man who we helped to hospital. It is quite sad to lose a young person," he said.

Hannah Wanjiru Waithanji, the mother to Kiratu in her tribute said she was proud to had watched him grow into the great example he was to his friends and family.

Wanjiru said Kiratu meant the world to her but sometimes life can be unkind.

"When hearts are torn in two but nothing ever could compare to the pain of losing you," she said.

Lucas Karobia, the father of Kiratu, said his son was a jovial person, full of life and attended the protests because he too wanted a change in the country's leadership.

"My son attended the protests because he is concerned about the progress of the country. If he knew he would meet his death on that day, he would not have gone for protests," Karobia said.

Karobia, a human rights activist, said President William Ruto should make a public apology to the families of persons who lost lives during the protests and compensate them.

"These are unarmed young men and women whose only crime is to ask that they be heard and they deserve to be heard and not killed the way they were killed. We demand a public apology," he said.

He said the arrogance exhibited by some members of Parliament over the Finance Bill led to the situation that the country finds itself in.

"We could have avoided the bloodshed if the people we sent to represent Kenyans in Parliament heard the cries and pleas of the people before passing the punitive Finance Bill," he said.

Karobia said as a family, they are devastated to lose their son and said that they hope no other family will undergo the pain they are going through in the hands of trigger-happy police.

George Kimani, the family lawyer, said the postmortem indicated that Kiratu died due to inhaling teargas that led to internal bleeding.

'We conducted the postmortem and the family will give me instructions on what next to do. No compensation is commensurate to a life of a person but somebody must be held accountable for the deaths of young people who were protesting for justice," he said.