Chinese Firm Mixing Skeletons With Murram for Construction Angers Locals

Local residents at Kiteta village in Kitui south constituency were up in arms against Chinese road constructors-Sinohydro Corporation Ltd, who they accuse of disturbing the dead.

A report by the Standard revealed that the Chinese firm tasked with constructing the Kibwezi-Kitui road during murram excavation on a hotly contested piece of land had exhumed 36 human skeletons with some allegedly being crushed in along with the murram.

Local witnesses claimed to have seen numerous bodies as well as decayed coffins dug up without any sense of decency and simply piled up on the side of the road mixed up with dirt and murram.

"These are fresh bones. The woman was buried recently as you can see, her remains have been dumped in a murram pile up," an elderly woman pointed out.

Residents claimed that a local tycoon sold off the graveyard site to due to its rich murram deposits with total disregard to the dead buried beneath the same ground.

According to the protesting locals, the land belonged to the Mutuku Mutunga and his three wives who have all since passed away and buried on the same grounds, leaving Mary Mutuku (a relative to the late Mutunga) to fight for the land.

Ms Mutuku claimed that the unnamed local tycoon had laid claim to the piece of land and sold it off to the Chinese despite a court ruling in her favour as the rightful owner.

"A rich man has been troubling us over here. He wants to sell the Chinese the entire village simply because the area is rich in road construction materials," Ms Mutuku disclosed to the Standard. 

The protestors made it known that desecrating the dead was against the local beliefs and that they had a right to be granted the decency of handling the remains of the loved ones in a humane manner for re-burial.

"The family has a right to be compensated and allowed to shift the graveyard in order to re-bury their loved ones elsewhere," Ms Mutuku's neighbour- Mwangangi Makau asserted.

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