MEP visit to Kenya
Linda McAvan MEP
In October, Practical Action took members of the European Parliament Linda McAvan and Fiona Hall to Kenya to see how European aid could be better spent on the people who need it most. Below, Linda describes her trip.
Monday 16 October
It was an early start to catch the 7.00am flight from Nairobi's Wilson airport to the market town of Eldoret. The turbo prop jet landed in a remarkably modern but small airport built by President Arap Moi who comes from this town.
From the airport we drove to the town of Kitale to visit Practical Action's work in Kipsongo slum. Around 3000 people here are squashed into huts made of rags on half an acre of land. They are displaced Turkana people, forced to leave their land because it is no longer fertile. Some have lived in the slum for 25 years or more. Practical Action has provided a spring for clean water and latrines and generally helped the community to clean up the camp. There is a camp council and a women's group has been formed to design crafts.
After a quick bite to eat, we left Kitale bound for the remote area of Alale in West Pokot. We'd been told that 82% of the population here are classified as living below the Kenyan poverty line and that there are dire problems of aridity and drought, causing major problems for the pastoralist farmers who make up the majority of the poor. We were also warned of the ongoing insecurity in this region and were accompanied by armed guards on the trip. Disputes over water are provoking tribal rivalries and cross-border skirmishes, which could, given the increasing availability of small arms, escalate into more serious conflict.
Nothing could prepare us for that 'road', a bumpy and dusty track which crossed numerous dried riverbeds for much of the journey. Our four-wheel drive struggled to make the journey.
We had a puncture and stopped in the pitch black to try to repair it - our armed guard eventually catching up with us. When we finally arrived in Alale at the lodge after what seemed like an eternity, I swore I would never complain again about driving round my constituency!
Tuesday 17 October
Our day began by driving on the dreadful roads again to the "centre" of Alale, and we arrived at an empty office with a sad history. In 1996, President Arap Moi had visited Alale in the run up to the 1997 elections and promised that the community would have their own District Commissioner, which would be a guarantee of public services arriving on the ground. However, he made his offer conditional on the local people building an office to house the Commissioner. So every family in the community sold the best cow in their herd and raised 5.5 million shillings to build the office. Eleven years on and nothing has happened. The offices lie empty, a white elephant on an arid strip of land. Local woman Unis Chekaourai told me: "We wonder whether we really belong in this country. We only know we are citizens of Kenya when there are military operations here. Are we part of Kenya?
We then made our way to Nauyapong District School, a primary school but the children's ages range massively - some children were in their late teens. They came from different tribes - Turkana, Pokot and Karamajong. The school was opened in 1990 but the high levels of insecurity meant it collapsed and only in the past three years has it been able to operate in peace. The coeducation of the children is seen as a means of reconciliation between the tribes. I noticed that very few children wore shoes - those that did wore sandals made out of old car tyres - a local enterprise! There are no overweight children here.
The children sang to us in all three languages. The girls sang that they wanted more education, and more information about HIV which is killing their people. They also sang "now that we have our primary school, take back your cows and leave me at school!" Some of the young girls already wore the clothes of married women; a few were as young as 11. Increasingly girls are being forced into young marriages because of their high dowry price in cows.
In the afternoon, we drove to the Lokitonyala area, to take part in a community meeting under the shade of a tree. A large circle of men were waiting for us, and a group of women were sitting separately - not in the shade, though thankfully that day was cloudy.
Members of the community came to the centre of the circle, one-by-one, to speak to us about the challenges they are facing and how they receive too little support from the government: failing rains and droughts are wiping out livestock; the lack of water means its also difficult to grow crops, and women have to walk 6-7 km just to collect water; there isn't enough money to pay for school fees; animal disease, particularly East coast fever; lack of food and sometimes famine; high levels of insecurity …these people were truly living on the edge.
We were then taken to visit a family homestead - this was an eye-opener because you got a much better feel for the dire poverty people live in. The typical homestead is a series of tiny huts - built by women. Women sleep indoors with very young children - married men will sleep with one of their wives (polygamy is the norm - the huts were arranged in a pattern of first wife onwards etc). Unmarried men and children sleep outside. One woman nursing her grandchild told us her daughter left early every morning to get water and only returned at dusk.
Leaving the village I was accosted by local women begging for some assistance, showing us their thin children - babies that never cry. People here get one meal per day if they are lucky. Our lack of lunch seemed irrelevant!
Wednesday 18 October
We got up early for the long drive back to Eldoret to catch the evening flight back to Nairobi. The drive back was eventful - at one point a lorry jack-knifed on the terrible road and we were stuck for ages until local people built us a passing point and pulled the larger vehicle in our convoy out with a rope. There was no time for lunch again, and we only got to the airport in the nick of time for our evening flight back to Nairobi.
We arrived back in Nairobi and finally got a cold beer and watched Sky News about the obesity crisis in Britain!
Thursday 19 October
Practical Action had planned a full day of meetings for us in Nairobi, starting with a meeting with officials from the European Commission delegation. The EC delegation explained how the bulk of European aid is channelled through the Government of Kenya, who plan their own development priorities. For the next five years, the government has identified 'rural development and agriculture' as a key area where European aid should be spent, but I remain worried that this funding will not reach the poorest people in more remote areas like Alale.
From the office of the EC delegation, we headed on to a meeting with leaders of civil society organisations from the marginalised North of Kenya. We heard a presentation about why aid is not trickling down to the poorest parts of the country. There was a strong feeling from the group that more European aid needs to be channelled through local authorities and not only through the central government. The participants also emphasized the need for local people to identify their own priorities, and that short-term NGO projects are not the solution to their problems.
The culmination of the day was a large round-table meeting with Kenyan MPs, officials from the European Commission delegation (who we had met earlier in the day), officials from the Kenyan government, and civil society organisations. Everyone recognised the need to support poor pastoralists and farmers in rural areas like Alale, and both the European Commission and the Kenyan government listed a number of things they are doing to channel resources to these 'less favoured regions'. But it didn't seem to reflect what I had seen during my time in Alale.
Friday 20 October
Today is Kenyatta Day and it is a public holiday in Kenya. We drove to Thika to visit the Sustainable Agriculture Community Development Programme (SACDEP). The organisation believes that the development of agriculture in poor countries has failed poor farmers, as it has focussed on cash crops for export. In Kenya, the majority of the population rely on small-scale agriculture, and most people own farms of only one hectare in size. Commercial farming practices have dominated the country, leaving 2.5 million Kenyans relying on food aid.
We visited a farm cooperative owned by Grace and Boniface Muli. The Muli's owned a small plot of land but it is flourishing and they are managing to grow bananas, beans, artemesin, maize, mangos and paw paw, as well as rearing goats, chickens, rabbits and turkeys. They had received a small loan from SACDEP to help buy irrigation pipes to they could water their crops, and they've been able to pay back the loan using the additional income they are making from selling their extra crops. It really showed me how a little bit of support can make a world of difference to small-scale farmers like Grace and Boniface.
We drove back to Nairobi for our de-briefing and final goodbyes, before heading back to the airport for our flight home.
Read Fiona Hall MEP's account of this trip
Photo gallery
View a selection of photographs documenting Linda and Fiona's visit to Practical Action's project work.
For more information, please contact Adam Musgrave adam.musgrave@practicalaction.org.uk
Link: Linda McAvan's website
