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Families on the verge on despair as agency appeals for relief food
DAILY NATION
Story by PETER KIMANI
Publication Date: 4/9/2007
Black smoke curls lazily across the clear blue skies, before thinning out to nothingness.
These are the initial hints of a settlement in Kaboiywa village, on the shoulder of the impenetrable rain forests that ring Mount Elgon on the Kenya-Uganda
border.
Women wait for relief food at Chebwek village in
Cheptais, Mt Elgon District yesterday. The Kenya Red Cross Society distributed food to families displaced by clashes in the
area. Photo/JARED NYATAYA |
Still, there is an eerie
silence. A bird coos in the distance, a dry twig breaks off a
tree.
Suddenly, a village comes into view and everything appears to happen at the same time.
A young girl energetically whirls a hand-operated grinding
mill, known there as rego rego, her efforts yielding in the sifted smudge that oozes in the nozzle
beneath.
A small boy is chasing after another clutching a container filled with
honey, licking away happily.
Even darker smoke issues from the hearth of a wobbly hut standing on the fringes of the
forest, where Fanis Cheptabot has just finished making a meal for her family of 20.
The meal is pretty simple: plain ugali that is to go round dozens of other children who have joined Cheptabot’s family after fighting in Chebyuk settlement started in earnest late last
year.
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A wrapped mattress is squeezed into a corner, its walls laden with piles of dirty clothes.
The jaded milk gourds point to the prosperous times the family may have once known, while the bows and arrows in another corner reveal the precarious existence of the hut’s dwellers.
But the bows and arrows are no match for the guns that gangs of marauding militias bear; neither is the house adequate to cushion Cheptabot and her family from the danger that lurks beyond the mountain.
“Two days ago, they reached up to that point,” she says, pointing to a shiny feature that distinguishes the nearby Huruma village, where the raiders from Uganda reached.
Cheptabot is a member of the Ndorobo (Elkony) clan of the larger Sabaot community that also comprise the Soy from whom the Sapiny, Bok and Bongomek clans derive their identity.
Different dialects
The complexity of the clan relationships is underlined by the fact that there are tens of sub-clans all of which claim unique identity and cultural heritage.
“There is need to clarify the historical backgrounds and geographical classification of these people, says a recent report by non-governmental organisations operating in Mount Elgon.
“Apparently, the Chepkitale community feels strongly marginalised in terms of resources and their identity has often times been misplaced.”
Historically and culturally, the Soy and the Ndorobo are of similar descent, and speak different dialects of the same language.
But their lifestyles differ, as the Soy live on the lower parts of the mountain and farm, while the Ndorobo-originally hunters and gatherers- inhabit higher grounds.
Haunt community
After the 1971 famine, when the Government proposed to settle the two clans in more habitable lands and encourage farming, it was expected that social harmony would persist with increased food security.
While that happened temporarily, incomplete land adjudication would return to haunt the community, while the population would swell over the years to ensure available plots would not be enough for applicants.
Acting district commissioner Julius Otieno said the Government had an easier problem to sort in 1917, “as the population was smaller then, but they procrastinated the land problem.”
But subsequent governments did not develop the area; it is possibly the only district in the country without an inch of tarmac.
The mode of transport in Mount Elgon is by walking or riding on donkeys or else one would have to have powerful 4-wheel drive vehicles.
Since the fighting broke out, families have been separated in their flight as they returned to the original settlements where their forefathers made a home in pre-independence Kenya, relying on relatives for protection.
On the return trip, the Nation team gave a ride to a woman searching for her daughter, who had not returned home after schools closed last week.
Twenty eight schools in the region closed early as teachers feared for their lives, according to Eldoret Anglican’s Rev Maritim Rerei.
On the same trip, TV crew from a local station also offered transport to an expectant mother in labour.
The crammed living quarters, inadequate food supplies and the low temperatures associated with mountains is likely to trigger further health complications, aid agencies warn.
The Red Cross say 43 people have died due to communicable diseases and other environmental factors since the displacement started seven months ago.
Altogether, 61,000 people left their homes, while food shortage looms since there is no one left to till the land.
The Nation team touring the region last week encountered hordes of people moving from their homes to settle in market centres, churches, schools, or with their kinsmen or with relatives in nearby locations.
Appeal for support
The clashes were previously concentrated in Tuikut and Kopsiro areas but have recently spread to Kapsokwony and Kitalale in neighbouring Trans Nzoia District.
Mount Elgon was the breadbasket for the entire district and its neighbours, which is now likely to entirely depend on food aid.
The relief agency said it had distributed more than 500 tonnes of food and appealed for more support.
The picture is no different in adjoining ridges where families have left their homes.
This feeling of hopelessness is replicated elsewhere in the region.
In a public meeting in Kaptama, near Kapsokwony, where the last killings took place, speaker after speaker lamented the continued incitement from politicians.
“I managed to escape only with these clothes,” said Reuben Ndiema, 64. “Now I have to start life anew.”
The sunshine that lights the hill suddenly wanes, as a rain cloud gathers fast. It melts in a downpour as the people scuttle and seek shelter.
For the homeless, it shall be a long night, likely to sleep cold and
hungry.
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