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Kenya: Internal Refugees Protest At Lack of Food
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The Nation (Nairobi)
25 April 2008
Posted to the web 25 April 2008
George Munene
Nairobi
More than 150 internal refugee families are camping at a district officer's offices in Kirinyaga District complaining of hunger and lack of shelter.
The starving victims stormed the Mwea administration office compound in Ngurubani Town on Wednesday evening and spent a night in the cold.
They want the Government to provide them with food and resettle them as soon as possible to end their suffering. The victims, who included children and elderly women, said they had not eaten anything in the last two days. They said good Samaritans who had been accommodating them since December 29 last year after they were kicked out of their homes were now chasing them away. "We are suffering from hunger and the Government seems to have forgotten us," Peninah Njeri, a mother of two from Nakuru, said.
Thursday, the area District Officer, Ms Ronda Rono, said she was shocked when she got to work in the morning only to find the hungry families protesting as administration police kept guard.
Eject them
The victims told the Nation that they had been harassed and intimidated by APs who threatened to eject them from the compound.
They said they would not to leave until their grievances were addressed. The DO tried in vain to convince the victims to disperse to their respective areas as the Government looks for a means of feeding and resettling them. "Plans are at an advanced stage to resettle all those who were displaced by post-election violence and you should disperse," she said. They had been residing at Murubara, Nguka, Thiba and Kerugoya areas after they fled their homes in Rift Valley, Nyanza and Western provinces due to the post-election violence.
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By the time of going to press, the DO was struggling to get food from well-wishers to feed the victims, who looked weak and exhausted.
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