Kiambu Gets 4 New Modern Fire Engines From National Government

Kiambu, Murang’a, Kajiado, Machakos and Nairobi Counties had their fire- fighting capacity and disaster response boosted following the national government’s commissioning of firefighting equipment worth Ksh 159 million.

The equipment included fire engines, rapid intervention vehicles, water bowsers and all terrain support vehicles.

While presiding over the occasion, Cabinet Secretary for Land, Housing and urban Development Prof Jacob Kaimenyi revealed that studies undertaken by the Ministry established that fire-fighting capacity of Counties was wanting and in desperate need of serious intervention.  He regretted incidents of loss of property, buildings and lives during fire outbreaks as a result of poor disaster preparedness and response.

Prof Kaimenyi urged county governments to put in place legal and institutional framework to promote fire safety in the country with an elaborate, efficient and effective mitigation and early warning systems, in addition to maintaining functioning fire protection and detection systems.

PS for Housing and Urban Development, Architect Aidah Munano asked counties to prioritise training more disaster management personnel including Fire fighters, volunteers, paramedics, counsellors, rescue dogs and handlers.

While flagging off the four modern fire engines that Kiambu County received, Governor William Kabogo on Thursday said his government will invest in improving the disaster management and response teams. So far the unit has been trained through a strategic partnership with the Polish government.

“We will continue to heavily invest in building capacity of our disaster management and response and have so far specially trained the unit through a strategic partnership with Polish Government. We have already started the construction of 5 new modern fire stations across the county to enhance our disaster response,” said Kabogo.

He added that they had set up an able Disaster Management and Prevention unit whose activities will include the co-ordination of disaster and emergencies response, the compilation and exercising of contingency plans, and Disaster Management education and training.

This unit, he said, would be in charge of coordinating the response of all disasters.

Last December, 40 fire fighters graduated after being trained on usage of modern equipment.