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My first meeting in Nairobi was with two young Sudanese men who had both been in Kakuma as refugees. It is a real pity we are unable to visit Kakuma at this time, however, I have more information regarding the situation there than I’d bargained for.

The most important outcome of this meeting is the realisation that we may not be able to run Home Lands, in its present form, in Kakuma at all. The situation there is much more dire than what we had been told.

It appears that pressure is being brought to bare on people to return to their Home Lands. Services to the people in the camp are being reduced. The Tarkuna (traditional land owners of the site where Kakuma is built upon) raid and loot the camp regularly. Food rations, beans and yellow maize is provided in meager amounts, barely enough for one meal a day, is dished out once every 15 days. Hygiene is very poor. There is no sewerage treatment. Life for those who make it to Nairobi is an ongoing struggle…

Will it be possible to take a camera in and train camp residents to document their lives there?

Why is it that such information isn’t readily available? I’ve read many reports from various NGOs and I’ve seen nothing that even vaguely points to the conditions I had described to me… what I’ve written here is only a snapshot drawn from my notes. There’s much more to come…

In my last post I’d published a schedule that would have seen me pulling out of Kakuma today. However, due to revisions in the project and budget caps, that schedule was further revised. As such, Grant and I prepared a status report and research options for the Cultural Development Network and the City of Melbourne.

In this report you can read what has been achieved to date. Grant and I were both impressed with the information thus far gathered and the networks established. For instance, I’m writing from the office of the Kenyan based Arid Lands Information Network (ALIN), an APC member, who have been terribly generous in providing space for me to work from whilst I’m in Nairobi.

Yes, I’m in Nairobi, having left Cape Town on Sunday and arriving via Johannesburg 6am, Monday morning. I’m staying in the Sarova Stanley, built in 1902, a most august establishment where Ernest Hemingway is said to have often stayed.

My schedule is now as follows:

• Sun 6 Apr: Cape Town to Nairobi via Johannesburg
• Mon 7 Apr: Jo’burg to Nairobi
• Mon 7 – Thu 10 Apr: Nairobi
• Thu 10 Apr: Nairobi to Istanbul via Johannesburg

As you can see, there’s no Kakuma Refugee Camp listed. Due to budgetary constraints we’ve had to pull back from arrangements made with UNHCR to visit the camp. Although regretful, what I hope to achieve in Nairobi ought to pave the way for a dedicated site visit when resources are available.

In the previous article I discussed the processes required to get me to Kakuma via the UNHCR and other required routes. In the next few articles I’ll provide a blow by blow description of getting there and anything of interest along the way.

Schedules

The schedule published in that first article is one of many that have been prepared along the way, and as of today, clearly not the last. Thanks to our travel agent, Cloud 9 Travel, I’ve been able to make these issue revised schedules and have flights re-booked with relative ease.

It’s been tricky to coordinate schedules for both Kenya and Thailand given the constraints of net access, work space issues and the excessive telephony tariffs throughout Africa, with South Africa perhaps the highest.

In addition, I’m now to ensure that I can coordinate UN charted flights from Nairobi to coincide with security escorts to and from Kakuma. But before I get this far, I’m still trying to get Kenyan Government approval to enter the camp and I can’t get this if I can’t coordinate communications with our proposed guide there, Peter Mabouch.

If Peter and I are unable to communicate frequently with each other would I still go to Kakuma? It would be a shame to have come this far and not go. In short, I’ll go, but with far more caution.

I’m also arranging to leave some of my luggage, including my guitar, at the APC office in Johannesburg. This means getting there and back from Nairobi, organising transports to and from the airport and accommodation in between.

Note: Have since made contact with Peter via colleagues in Melbourne, but unable to reach the Kenyan Government official we need to communicate with prior to fixing our schedule with the UN (charted flights, security escort, etc.).

I’m making plans for Kenya now that I have a line of contact through to the UNHCR in Geneva and their officers in Nairobi. It will be interesting to see how much of the trip from here on in can be organised remotely, particularly flights. Given my replacement credit card will only work at point of sale, not via the net nor phone, I’m having to rely entirely on our travel agent to make all my bookings.

Here’s the proposed travel schedule that should see me leaving Cape Town on the morning of Monday, 10 March.

• 10 Mar: Cape Town to J’burg, late morning.
• 11 Mar: J’burg to Nairobi
• 13 Mar: Nairobi to Lokichoggio, Kenya (leaves from Wilson Airport, Nairobi)
• 16 Mar: Lokichoggio to Nairobi
• 16 Mar: Nairobi to J’burg

I’m working on the basis that I wouldn’t need to spend more than 2 -3 days in Kakuma covering traveling time and other unforeseen logistics.

I hope to travel with Peter Mabouch, a young Sudanese refugee who had been in the Kakuma Refugee Camp since 1992. He’s been briefed by Archangelo N. Madut, or Nyuol as we’ve got to know him, a counselor/advocate based at Foundation House. Peter is keen play the role of identifying participants to the project in the camp, or alternatively, recruit others in Nairobi should we find too many limitations hindering involvement of participants in Kakuma.

At the outset of this research project for Home Lands we’d planned to look at the Thailand end of the project. With the problems in Kenya and subsequent uncertainties, it seemed unfeasible. However, being as I was in South Africa, if there were to be any possibility that I could get there, and if my colleagues back in Melbourne approved, I’d head in.

It was during the Home Lands presentation I’d made at the APC Eboard, staff and management meeting in Ithala, South Africa, that the first step to Kakuma had been taken. Not only were APC people enthusiastic about the possibility of having me there, Karen Banks and Anriette Esterhuysen were confident that our contacts through to UNHCR in Geneva would help to pin point the right people to get the necessary protocols for my visit seen to.

They were right! Karen asked me to prepare a briefing paper and after it had been sent, it was only a matter of days before we had a contact in Geneva who subsequently put me directly in touch with his colleagues in Nairobi, asking them to assist in making the necessary arrangements for my visit to Kakuma. The first thing I had to do was just get to Nairobi to ensure their support for the Home Lands project, my research trip and the logistics required to get me in and out of there.

I’ve also been in touch with James Nguo, Regional Director of the Arid Lands Information Network-Eastern Africa (ALIN) and Tony Roberts from Computer Aid, a frequent visitor to Nairobi. Given that ALIN are APC members, working with James has been entirely necessary as he’s provided views to the political situation in Kenya that are not widely known, at least not in my circles. Tony has joined the Home Lands team as part of the growing reference committee and will be an invaluable resource as I take my first steps on Kenyan soil.