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A company linked to a senior Migori county government officer has been faulted after it failed to pay up workers who it contracted to work on the Migori – Masaba – Kehancha road construction project.

Angry residents who were hired to work along the newly constructed road stormed the Deputy Governor’s office in Migori demanding their pay in arrears after they completed work.

The workers largely drawn from Masaba ward, Kuria West Constituency, said those charged with paying them have been avoiding them for the last four months.

Susan Atieno said a group of 107 workers were in agreement with their employer to plant grass along the newly constructed Migori – Kehancha road in April this year.

“It has been four months that we have engaged in the tedious job all on our own. It’s surprising, the development of things now,” she said.

She explained that their job involved ferrying and filling soil besides the road, looking for grass and planting it.

She added: “We were also not only tasked with looking for water to plant the grass, but also watering the grass to ensure that it does not whither.”

Catherine Mwita said that they are languishing in poverty and needed the money to help cater for their family’s needs.

“We have no other source of income and had banked all our hope on this job but nothing has been forth-coming,” she said.

The residents have threatened to organise a demonstration to seek redress with Deputy Governor Mwita Mahanga and are demanding close to half a million shillings for their work.

They have linked to the dispute to two officers in Mahanga’s office.

“We were here (Deputy Governor’s office) a week ago and were told to come back this week, but on seeing us, the two ignored us,” Mwita said.

But speaking on phone, one of the officer refuted the claims saying that the residents were wrongfully involving him in the dispute.

He explained the company won the tender and will be handling workers’ pay issues.

Efforts to reach Murimi for a comment were futile as he failed to pick our calls and answer to text messages.