• by Mary Kiio (nairobi)
• Friday, March 19, 2010
• Inter Press Service

A week after torrential rains and floods claimed lives in Kenya’s North Rift region, hundreds of displaced people are now in dire need of relief aid.

In Turkana, one of the worst affected areas, hundreds of homes have been washed away by floods or buried under landslides. Access to clean water and sanitation have become a major issue in the area, where the displaced have to relieve themselves in bushes.

'My house was suddenly filled with water. My toilet was carried away, and also the vegetables, which I had planted on my farm,' lamented Godfrey Chume, one of the displaced residents in the Turkana area.

The father of two said he gathered up his family members and quickly ran up a hill to be swept away by the torrents. 'My boys came down with a fever. For now, my family is staying with neighbours, as I work towards rebuilding what was destroyed,' Chuma told IPS.

Strong flood waters caused the Kerio river to burst its banks in the area, destroying irrigation schemes, roads as well as fields, especially sorghum and maize crops, which is likely to result in food shortages for many months to come.

Chume says his and other families, who live in a settlement called California, in the Turkana district, say they have not been reached by any of the relief aid distributed by government and non-governmental organisations. They have been struggling to put enough food on the table and have used their little savings to buy from a nearby town. But in the long-run, they will end up in a difficult situation, Chume believes, because their livelihoods depend on the yields from their farmlands.

Luckily, the schools and hospital in Turkana, built slightly uphill, were not affected by the floods, so that Chume’s children are able to continue their education uninterrupted.

Although the California village has not been reached by humanitarian support as yet, the Kenya Red Cross Society has been one of the international and national aid agencies providing food and material support to the displaced.

Other agencies have particularly focused on limiting the cholera outbreak caused by lack of sanitation. 'We have helped over 600 people affected by the cholera outbreak, through (education) and water treatment tablets,' says Emanuel Mkoba, integrated programme area manager at international aid organisation WorldVision. Throughout Kenya, the Red Cross estimates that more than 10,000 people have been affected by the floods, claiming the lives of 19 people. Hundreds of cattle, goats, sheep and donkeys — livestock indispensible for rural livelihoods — have been lost.

In Turkana, at least 240 households need to relocate to higher grounds to avoid them being damaged in case of future floods. Kenya Red Cross Society regional manager for the North Rift Valley, Patrick Nyongesa, says there is great concern the area will flood again if the rains resume, or in the rainy season in May and June.

The Red Cross has requested a number of interventions for the Turkana area, including improved river bank protection, reinstallation of five water hand pumps to give residents access to clean drinking water, supply of seeds, so that farmers can re-plant their lost crops and rebuilding of damaged infrastructure.

Turkana has fertile land but lacks adequate water sources to make farming more viable. According to Nyongesa, the area needs better irrigation systems to make the people of Turkana independent from aid and create food security in the long-term. The construction of a dam, he says, would go a long way towards transforming the area. So far, it remains unclear how such interventions will be financed.

Apart from planning disaster relief and reconstruction, meteorological and agricultural experts have been analysing the impact of changes in weather patterns on the severity of floods that have hit the area in recent years.

Christopher Ekuwom, Oxfam project officer in Turkana Turkana, says the area has experienced longer droughts and in shorter succession. 'After a prolonged drought episode, flash floods come in a torrential manner, which can cause floods. If (rains) continue pouring for over four days, it usually affects the rivers and may cause them to burst,' he further explains.

Oxfam is now collaborating with Kenyan meteorologists to put in place an internal early warning monitoring system for changes in weather patterns, in the to reduce the impact of future floods.

To be able to better handle heavier rains, Kenya will need to put up a bigger fight against land degradation and improve existing drainage systems to ensure water can run off, instead of causing flash floods. 'The rain patterns may have become heavier so that the ground cannot contain the increase in water,' explains Ayub Shaka, researchers at the Kenya Meteorological Department.

© Inter Press Service (2010) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service

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