Oxfam in Kenya
Oxfam Ireland’s Humanitarian Coordinator Michael O’Riordan spent 6 weeks so far in Turkana, Kenya helping to coordinate our response there.
Our rural water and sanitation programme in Turkana will help 140,000 people through borehole drilling, public health promotion, and water point rehabilitation and maintenance.
Oxfam is supporting small traders by providing working capital for the market so that traders can restock and link up with food markets outside of Turkana. Michael is also involved in this essential programme start-up.
We are also providing support to pastoralists whose livelihoods have been destroyed; scaling up our ongoing cash and food transfer programmes to support over 250,000 people.
Oxfam has been working in Kenya since independence in 1963. In Kaijaido, Oxfam Ireland works with the Pastoralist Community by supporting the work of Mainyioto Pastoralists Integrated Development Organisation (MPIDO). Working with Pastoralist Communities is a core Livelihoods theme for Oxfam Ireland’s work in East and Central Africa.
Working with pastoralist communities
Kenya’s Pastoralist communities have lived on their semi-arid grazing lands for many generations. However, Pastoralist communities have become increasingly marginalised in recent years, coming under immense pressure in relation to their rights to occupy their ancestral land. Fraudulent and irregular land appropriation has happened in Kajido District, where non-residents, government officials, local authority representatives, and their associates have been granted titles to Pastoralist land. The communities, through their representative organisation, MPIDO, have struggled to counter this corruption. The efforts have focused on court challenges, which have the potential to bring redress for the affected communities and set a precedent for other pastoralist communities affected.
The Land Rights Programme
With Oxfam’s support, the Land Rights Programme has been able to collect and collate information concerning land appropriation by senior government officials and their families thus making hard evidence available for the communities’ claims. Having the evidence in hand, MPIDO has been able to publicise the Land cases both at National and International levels thus able to solicit support for the affected communities. MPIDO is currently engaging with the Presidential Commission of Enquiry on the Irregular and Fraudulent Acquisition of Title Deeds and/or land in Kenya.
The Oxfam-supported well in Malawi
€28/ £22 can Fix a Well from Oxfam Unwrapped. This gift will go towards providing a builder and the materials to construct a well, while communities provide the skills and labour to help build and maintain it.
