6 November 2009
The United Nations refugee agency is appealing for $2.8 million to provide essential supplies and respond to possible disease outbreaks among more than 300,000 refugees in two camps in Kenya threatened by flooding.
Andrej Mahecic, spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told reporters in Geneva that the agency has already begun to make engineering improvements in the two camps - Kakuma in north-western Kenya and Dadaab in the east.
Located some 90 kilometres from the border with Somalia, Dadaab - the largest refugee site in the world - is actually a complex of three camps that were built to house 90,000 people but today are home to more than three times that number.
"We fear that the looming El Nino phenomenon - a change in the atmosphere and ocean of the tropical Pacific region that produces floods, droughts and other weather disturbances in many regions of the world - may now threaten the 338,000 mostly Somali refugees in the two camps, which in any case usually are flooded for three months every year," he said.
UNHCR began digging trenches and placing sandbags around hospitals, boreholes and other strategic locations in both camps when the heavy rains began three weeks ago. The agency noted that if not for these and other measures, many sections of the camp would have been inundated.
Mr. Mahecic added that UNHCR is preparing to locate to higher ground within the camps refugees who might be worst affected by the floods, particularly the chronically ill, disabled people, the elderly and children and teenagers on their own.
It has also diverted two seasonal rivers, the Tarach and Lodoket, to protect refugees in Kakuma, the camp that has been hardest hit by floods in the past.
This is not the first time these two camps have had to deal with the impacts of severe flooding, UNHCR pointed out. The worst flooding in Kakuma was recorded in May 2003, during which the homes of some 16,800 refugees were destroyed. In addition, a number of latrines overflowed and collapsed, leading to the spread of water-borne diseases, including cholera and dysentery.
The overcrowded Dadaab complex last experienced severe flooding in 2006, the agency added.
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A very interesting and thoughtful article. The best way for Africa to help itself with GHG is to stop exporting oil and gas to the outside world. Gas that is valuable enough to ship abroad and sell should be sold at a price that is competitive enough to keep it home. Catch all of that gas, and use it for yourselves. You will then have electricity and cooking fuel both. It is maddening to see forests felled for charcoal cooking fuel while cleaner-to-use gas is being wasted. Each of your nations should try to be the last to run out of fuel. Move to solar, wind, geothermal and biofuels from wastes for your energy sources.
Other activities to fight climate change troubles include the restoration of your waterways to full functionality by clearing the weeds that clog them and the silt that they have left behind.
Just a factual correction. Nigerian LNG is not sold to Benin, Togo and Ghana. There is a gas pipeline from Nigeria to these three countries. But it does not carry LNG. It carries natural gas under pressure. Unfortunately, becuse there is insufficient gas being gathered and shipped from Nigeria, the pipeline has been empty for over a year.
In today's climate talk that's going and will be converse more in December must not be damaging to Africa. Together, Africa MUST STAND FIRMLY and get what she deserves - BETTER and LASTING AGREEMENT. That's, what is beneficial for Africa. Any negativities effects concerning our people standard of living MUST NOT be accepted by any Africa Government. The days of a/an African Live seeing as less than an insect or any other most be OVER and SHOULD NOT be negotiated in any Climate talks. Our "Africans" lives and living standard is/are as important as any other lives. Therefore, as Africans head to the climate talk in December, please open your ears, listen carefully, don't be trick, and don't accept anything lesser to solve your prombles for the betterness of your people in the whole of Africa - period !!!!! The days of damaging Africans' lives, enviroment, living conditions; the physical and metal abuses should and most all come to an end. Therefore, we "Africans" should not be conveince with their sweet tooth to accept something lesser where'in our people keep continue to suffer and die for their pleasures and the lack of consideration for Africans lives and living standards. God Bless Africa
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