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IDPs leave city for "ancestral
homes"
NAIROBI, 8 February 2008 (IRIN) - Thousands of people displaced
from the suburbs on the western edge of the capital, Nairobi, have
left for their "ancestral homes" in western Kenya, according to
humanitarian workers.
"We had a total of 17,000 people here [Kabete Police Station] last
week but they have been leaving since Friday [1 February] for
their ancestral homes in areas such as Kisumu, Bondo, Busia,
Kakamega and Kitale," Regina Munguti, a volunteer with the
Catholic Justice and Peace Commission, told IRIN on 8 February.
She said the displaced had fled their rental houses in Kikuyu,
Kinoo and Ndumbuini areas after they received leaflets threatening
them with death. Most of were from Luo and Luhya communities, she
added.
Munguti said only eight of the 17 families still left at the camp
for displaced people had said they had nowhere to go.
"These are the families who know no other home apart from the
houses they vacated; they would not know where to go once they get
to western Kenya," she said. "We have referred four children, a
girl and three boys, to a children's home after they got separated
from their families."
The displacement in Nairobi as well as in the central Kenya region
has followed the initial displacement of thousands of people from
Western, Nyanza and Rift Valley provinces, which were hardest hit
by the violence that erupted in late December 2007 following
disputed presidential elections.
Protests over the re-election of President Mwai Kibaki led to the
violence that has so far claimed at least 1,000 lives and
displaced 300,000 more, mostly from Rift Valley Province. The
violence has since taken on ethnic dimensions, with the
communities who find themselves the minority in such areas at risk
of death.
"Life has been difficult here at the police station and I am glad
that I am scheduled to leave today," Samson Opoyo, a tailor who
had lived in Uthiru Gichagi [western Nairobi] for 10 years, said.
"When we left our homes about a week-and-a-half ago, I had my wife
and three children with me but I have since managed to have them
taken to my original home in Oyugis [Nyanza Province]. I hope to
board a bus any time now."
The buses carrying the displaced join other commercial bus convoys
to western Kenya that have a security presence.
Munguti said 50 of the IDPs left on 8 February for Bondo and Busia
areas of Nyanza and Western provinces and that another 22 were due
to leave later in the day for Kitale, a town in Rift Valley
Province.
She said the transportation of the IDPs was being carried out by
charitable organisations and individual volunteers. Lifeskills
Promoters, an educational NGO working with youths aged between 18
and 24, has provided transport for most of the Kabete IDPs.
"We realised that many youths had been caught up in the crisis in
our country and after visiting this camp, transportation was
identified as the most urgent need," Isaac Mwaniki, a partnerships
officer for Lifeskills Promoters, told IRIN. "Today we are
organising the transportation of 22 people to Kitale [western
Kenya]."
The Kenya Red Cross Society has been providing food for the IDPs
at Kabete Police Station, Munguti said. Women and children were
sleeping in a hall nearby while the men spent the nights in the
open, she added.
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