Little Magdalena wins Sh147m in damages

Musoma. The district court here has slapped the Free Pentecostal Church of Tanzania (FPCT) with Sh147 million in punitive damages in a lawsuit lodged by eight-year-old girl Magdalena Mukama whose oesophagus and intestines were severely damaged after she mistook caustic soda for water at school in 2002.

Magistrate Baraka Maganga said the church could not escape liability for the suffering of the child because her taking of toxic chemicals at the school, which is owned by the church, was caused by negligence.

The same court had in May ordered the church to pay the amount but the religious organisationn appealed against the decision because the case was heard without its presence. It also argued that if the money was paid the church would suffer irreparably.

But in a judgment he delivered on Monday, magistrate Maganga said the absence of the church at the hearing was not a sufficient reason to delay the course of justice.

For three years now little Magdalena has led a painful life after she mistakenly took caustic soda, a chemical that was stored in one of the rooms in her kindergarten to be used for a soap making training. The same room in which the school kept drinking water for the children.

Her digestive system was severely damaged and blocked, a situation that forced doctors to insert tubes in her stomach to help feed her.

Magdalena’s father had taken her to several hospitals in the country including Musoma regional hospital, Bugando in Mwanza and Muhimbili National Hospital (MNH) to save her life, before the government came to his help to take the child to India for specialised treatmet. In India, she underwent several operations.

Mr Mukama filed a case in May asking the court to order the church to pay his child Sh147 million to enable her to seek treatment prescribed by doctors at Apollo Hospital in India.

Through his lawyer Ostack Mligo, Mukama accused the church of breaching its duty of caring for the child and left her to take the chemical which was negligently stored into a room in which pupils used to store drinking water.

Magdalena has neither attended school nor played with her friends due to poor health and the fear that tubes used to feed her could be interfered with.

At the hearing of the case, Mr Mukama also informed the court that he has failed to return her daughter to India for checkup due to his difficult financial situation even as her daughter’s health was deteriorating by the day.