Passengers stranded after being booked in bedbug infested bus
What you need to know:
- The company management was forced to issue new tickets to some passengers while others exchanged tickets with those who did not mind travelling with bedbugs.
- Contacted for comment, the director of the bus company said the bedbug problem had hit the whole county and that the transport sector had also been affected.
Some passengers traveling to Nairobi from Mombasa were forced to cut short their journey on Wednesday night after realizing that the bus they were traveling in was infested with bedbugs.
The passengers protested at the popular bus company offices on Kenyatta Avenue, forcing the management to intervene.
Some of the passengers took to social media to lament about the condition of the bus.
The company management was forced to issue new tickets to some passengers while others exchanged tickets with those who did not mind travelling with bedbugs.
“I am a sad Kenyan this morning. I should have been in Nairobi and probably done with the business which takes me there by now. I boarded a 10.30pm bus yesterday night but disembarked an hour into the journey. Reason? BEDBUGS!” said Lyne Kay on her social media page.
Another passenger, Roselyn Njoki, said because of the bedbugs she decided to switch to another bus.
“Bedbug menace has hit our [buses]. We boarded the bus which had a foul smell as if it had been fumigated. But before the journey started, the bedbugs struck, with everyone scratching their bodies,” she said.
She said some passengers decided to take another bus but others decided to continue with their journey regardless of the bedbugs.
Contacted for comment, the director of the bus company said the bedbug problem had hit the whole county and that the transport sector had also been affected.
However, he said the management had change the travel dates for some of their customers.
"We gave them new tickets and they travelled on Thursday morning. People were complaining, I can’t tell because I was not there. It is their right to talk, but why did the rest travel with the same bus to Nairobi? Why didn’t others complain? The bedbug problem is everywhere but we fumigate the buses every day,” he added.
Last year, members of the Mombasa County Assembly discussed the bedbugs menace after it spread to schools, urging the education department to prevent the bedbugs from spreading to homes and other areas.
