UN dispatches more aid as Kenya crisis continues

United Nations agencies are bolstering their assistance to Kenyans in the aftermath of the deadly wave of violence which erupted after last month’s disputed elections, claiming more than 500 lives and displacing hundreds of thousands.

Roads were closed from early this morning as riot police lined the perimeter of the Parliament building in downtown Nairobi, the capital. The UN Department of Safety and Security (DSS) said that there have been no confirmed security incidents, but advised caution ahead of rallies called for by the opposition scheduled to take place today and tomorrow.

Violence erupted in the Eastern African nation late last month after President Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner of the election, and opposition leader Raila Odinga has disputed the results.

A one-week supply of food – including cereals, pulses, high-energy biscuits, vegetable oil and corn-soya blend – provided by the UN World Food Programme (WFP) and the Kenyan Government was distributed today to nearly 77,000 people in four slums in Nairobi. Last week, WFP food was given out to 50,000 people – not including those fed today – in the same area.

Food distribution in these slums – some of the largest in Africa – is a priority since most residents depend on casual labour for their survival and were unable to work due to the recent unrest. Nearly 60 per cent of Nairobi’s population of 2.75 million lives in the city’s slums.

Schools nationwide re-opened yesterday, and WFP fed over 100 schools in the capital’s slums.

To date, WFP food aid has reached over 225,000 people in Nairobi, the Northern Rift Valley and the country’s west.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) expects today to finish distributing over 1,000 family kits – containing plastic sheeting for shelter, blankets, jerry cans, mosquito nets and kitchen sets – in Narok, 140 kilometres south-east of Nairobi.

Currently, there are some 3,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) taking refuge in nearly one dozen different sites around the Narok district, which is mainly inhabited by the Maasai community.

Many of the displaced in this area lack shelter and sanitation, and UNHCR – in conjunction with its partner, the non-governmental organization (NGO) World Concern – commenced a second distribution of basic commodities yesterday.

UNHCR also dispatched trucks to deliver sanitary supplies for up to 20,000 girls and women in the Rift Valley.

“We expect to deliver nearly 50,000 sanitary packs for 16,000 women and girls in the provincial capital, Nakuru, and another 10,000 packs for 3,300 beneficiaries in Eldoret,” the agency’s spokesperson Ron Redmond told reporters in Geneva.

The Kenyan Government estimates that there are 500 IDP sites throughout the country – concentrated in the Rift Valley, Western, Nyanza and Nairobi provinces – and that the total number of displaced people has dropped from 255,000 at the start of last week to 203,000 by the week’s close as the security situation improved.

The IDP camps “continue to be transitory in nature with people moving from the sites to their ancestral areas, where possible, or joining their kin in safer areas,” Mr. Redmond noted.

UNHCR, in concert with the Government, the Kenya Red Cross Society and other NGOs, continues work on camp management. It organized a one-day training session for NGO staff to ensure minimum standards and consistency in delivering services in the camps.

The agency estimates that its budget to deal with the situation in Kenya – protection, assistance delivery, camp coordination and management, emergency shelter and HIV/AIDS projects – is $6.4 million, which is part of a greater UN consolidated appeal for $40 million to be launched tomorrow in New York.

Meanwhile, the Ugandan Government reports that more than 6,000 Kenyans have crossed into that country. The refugees are staying in schools and other public facilities, as well as with host families. Uganda hopes to move the refugees to a temporary site in Mulanda, for which UNHCR will provide transportation. The agency is channelling its assistance to Kenyans in Uganda through the Uganda Red Cross.

For its part, WFP food has been distributed today at the border town of Busia to 2,000 Kenyans.