More than 30,000 bags of maize in Mbeere to be destroyed

By Moses Njagih

More than 30,000 bags of maize will be destroyed in Mbeere, even as residents continue to battle hunger.

The Government is set to burn 31,781 bags of the grain, which was stored at the National Cereals and Produce Board’s (NCPB) Ishiara depot, after it was declared poisonous and unfit for human consumption.

The maize bags, worth Sh83 million, contain high levels of afflatoxin and condemned by the Public Health ministry as "unfit for consumption".

The irony is that the meal will be burned when more than 100,000 residents of the district urgently require relief food, owing to total crop failure in the area.

The maize, which has been lying at the depot since April 2006, has been a subject of a court battle between the Public Health Ministry and the NCPB, who were against the decision to destroy it.

The board wanted permission to sell the grain cheaply to a glue manufacturing company, in order to avoid a huge loss.

Poisonous

The Public Health ministry, through the District Public Health Officer Robert Kiturya, moved to the court in Siakago to seek orders to destroy the maize.

After the hearing, Siakago Senior Resident Magistrate Samuel Mokua last Thursday declared the food poisonous and ordered it to be destroyed.

The court ruled that an analysis conducted by the National Public Health Laboratory Services had found the maize poisonous.

Yesterday, local DC John Chelimo said 11 locations in the district were on the relief food programme since before December, last year.

"More than half of the district’s population is now facing starvation and in need of relief supply. Though we had only 11 locations under the programme by December, the number have increased after the total crop failure," he said.

Mr Chelimo said they had received 3,000 maize bags for relief food in September and October.

"We are expecting to receive more since we have requested for additional supplies," he said.

He said the situation had greatly affected schooling in the area, where many children are dropping out.

But he said they expected supplies from the schools-feeding programme after officials visited the area.