Twelve students and two teachers are still recovering at various hospitals in Kapsowar, Eldoret after they were injured when bandits attacked a convoy of school buses in Elgeyo Marakwet killing a driver on Friday.
Doctors removed bullets from the injured teachers and students of Tot Secondary School who were attacked along Arror -Mogil road as they returned from a trip in Baringo.
Leaders and parents from the region intensified calls on the government to act fast and tame the attacks which they fear may affect national examinations next month.
Officials from teachers unions Kuppet and Knut said teachers may be forced to withdraw from schools in the region if the security situation remains volatile.
“The situation is unfortunate and gangs which attack innocent school children cannot be termed as bandits. They are criminals that must be dealt with ruthlessly,” former IG Joseph Boinnet said after visiting the injured.
The students and the teachers were from an academic tour in a convoy of three buses belonging to Tot Day School, Kerio Valley School and Mogil school.
They were ambushed near Chesuman Primary School in Marakwer West.
The heavily armed bandits attacked the leading bus for Mogil Secondary School killing the driver instantly and then sprayed bullets indiscriminately at the students and teachers in the vehicle.
The injured were rescued by villager who rushed to the scene and took them to hospital.
Some of the victims who were in the bus narrated how the bandits after killing the driver got into the bus and shot indiscriminately until one student talked to them in a local language pleading that they be spared.
“When they heard me talking in a dialect they understood, one of them got surprised that students from his community were also in the bus, at that point they stopped shooting and ran away,” the student said.
Doctors said some of the students and teachers would remain in hospital for weeks.
Five armed police officers have been deployed to Tot Secondary School where parents and students expressed fear for their lives.
Elgeyo Marakwet county commissioner John Korir said security teams were hunting down the attackers.
“They will see the kind of ruthlessness they have never seen. Those involved will pay a heavy price,” Korir said.
Residents in both West Pokot and Elgeyo Marakwet protested against the attack with villagers in Pokot asking elders to curse those involved in banditry.
"These bandits must be found and brought to book. This is too much and unacceptable," Boinnet said.
Senator Kipchumba Murkomen who also visited the injured termed the attackers as terrorists and accused CS for Interior Fred Matiang'i of incompetence in dealing with security matters.
Matiang'i had ordered for the arrest of the head teacher of the Tot school for allowing the buses to ferry students at night contrary to government regulations but Murkomen accused the CS of dealing with side shows.
Other leaders who visited the recovering students and teachers included Governor Alex Tolgos of Elgeyo Marakwet, his deputy Wesley Rotich, Marakwet East MP Kangogo Bowen among others.
Tolgos called on the government to act with seriousness and tame the attacks that have caused the death of more than 85 people in six months.
The government has planned to carry out a forceful disarmament in the area get illegal arms from civilians.
Heavy deployments of security teams have not scared the bandits who continue to carry out attacks in the region almost in daily basis.
-Edited by SKanyara
