What Ruto told me when he called at 1am: Dad of 7-year-old boy killed by the DP’s convoy

The father of 7-year-old boy, Sidney Mambala, who was killed by a vehicle in Deputy President William Ruto’s convoy Friday evening has revealed details of his short phone conversation with the DP.

A postmortem examination conducted on Sidney on Saturday showed he died from respiratory failure.

The boy’s father, Felix Mambala, says the DP called him via the phone of the area OCPD at 1am Saturday and condoled with him after he [DP] learnt of the boy’s death which occurred at 9:45pm Friday shortly after being admitted at the Busia County Referral Hospital.

“The DP called the area OCPD, and asked him to pass the phone to me. DP Ruto told me to take heart, promising to look into my family’s welfare. He also promised to foot all the funeral expenses,” Mr Mambala told EDAILY.

According to Felix, his son was referred to Busia County Referral Hospital from Port Victoria Hospital in Budalangi at around 7pm, and by 9pm, he hadn’t been attended to at Busia.

“The doctor at Busia Hospital, in a rather surprising question, asked what had happened to the boy, yet he could clearly see from a report what the doctors at Port Victoria Hospital had diagnosed the boy with. We stayed for long at Busia Hospital without seeing any medic attending to my son,” said Felix.

Busia Hospital, however, denied not attending to Sidney in good time, saying they needed to do body scans to establish whether the boy had suffered internal injuries.

According to a doctor at the hospital, they received Sidney at 7:45pm and by 8:10pm, they had already begun attending to him.

After learning of the Class One pupil’s death, DP Ruto sent his communications director Emmanuel Talam to meet the boy’s family and convey his condolence message.

“The DP has ordered the investigating officers to probe Sidney’s death, saying he [Ruto] believes the boy did not deserve to die in such a manner,” said Talam in Budalangi.

Dr Hillary Kiplagat of Busia County Referral Hospital, who conducted an autopsy on Sidney, said the 7-year old boy died from excessive bleeding into the left lung.

Sidney was run over by a vehicle carrying the DP’s press team at 4:50pm Friday.