75.
A Heartbreaking Journey
Through The Famine-Stricken Territories
By Lisa, Oxfam News, July 27th, 2011
Jim Clarken, chief executive of Oxfam Ireland, spent a week in the Horn of Africa in 2011. He travelled as part of a group of NGOs sent to assess the devastating situation and hear the stories of some of those directly affected by the famine. Former UN High Commissioner Mary Robinson, who is the Honorary President of Oxfam International, also took part in the visit.
Here, Mr Clarken describes for the Irish Daily Mail his heartbreaking journey through the famine-stricken territories.
Someone once said to me that the worst sight in the world was a hungry mother trying to feed a hungry, crying baby from an empty breast. In East Africa, and particularly Somalia, this is the scenario being played out each day now.
Mothers and fathers, having literally run out of options when it comes to providing the basics for their children, are burying them instead of being able to nurture them.
As a parent myself, I could imagine the despair to which parents were driven in this terrible struggle to survive.
But this week I got to meet some of those parents, during a visit to Kenya and Somalia with former Irish President Mary Robinson – who is now the president of Oxfam International – and other Irish aid agencies.
We saw first hand the trauma experienced by exhausted people who were pouring into Kenya across the Somali border. They had been walking for days in some cases, supporting elderly parents, coaxing young children along and carrying young babies. Some had been forced to leave the weaker, older people behind, others had left infant children.
When families were lucky enough to reach the safety of Dadaab refugee camp, they were able to get food, water and shelter, along with medical attention for the severely malnourished. Thousands of people are now arriving in this camp each day.
Every single coping mechanism they might have had is gone. They have typically sold their livestock, eaten or sold any crops and run out of money to buy food if it was available.
Here, Mr Clarken describes for the Irish Daily Mail his heartbreaking journey through the famine-stricken territories.
Someone once said to me that the worst sight in the world was a hungry mother trying to feed a hungry, crying baby from an empty breast. In East Africa, and particularly Somalia, this is the scenario being played out each day now.
Mothers and fathers, having literally run out of options when it comes to providing the basics for their children, are burying them instead of being able to nurture them.
As a parent myself, I could imagine the despair to which parents were driven in this terrible struggle to survive.
But this week I got to meet some of those parents, during a visit to Kenya and Somalia with former Irish President Mary Robinson – who is now the president of Oxfam International – and other Irish aid agencies.
We saw first hand the trauma experienced by exhausted people who were pouring into Kenya across the Somali border. They had been walking for days in some cases, supporting elderly parents, coaxing young children along and carrying young babies. Some had been forced to leave the weaker, older people behind, others had left infant children.
When families were lucky enough to reach the safety of Dadaab refugee camp, they were able to get food, water and shelter, along with medical attention for the severely malnourished. Thousands of people are now arriving in this camp each day.
Every single coping mechanism they might have had is gone. They have typically sold their livestock, eaten or sold any crops and run out of money to buy food if it was available.
Tears Of Blood
Eyes Are Too Parched To Shed Tears
Driving across the Chalbi Desert,on our way to Marsabit Town in Northern Kenya, we came across two herders, an old man and young boy. Jarosyl Adi was in his 70s and told us how he had lived in the area all of his life. He spoke about how much things have changed in his lifetime, about how much further they have to bring their cattle to try to find food and water. He told us that he has never seen things as bad as this.
The people here mainly live off their animals – everything you own is your cattle or your goats – but it’s been so dry that the animals are weak and dying.
The only livestock we saw on our journey were camels, and even they were weak. We were told that they are dying of thirst and keeling over –things are severe if a camel can’t survive. We travelled on and passed through a small village of about 1,700 women, children and old men.
The people here mainly live off their animals – everything you own is your cattle or your goats – but it’s been so dry that the animals are weak and dying.
The only livestock we saw on our journey were camels, and even they were weak. We were told that they are dying of thirst and keeling over –things are severe if a camel can’t survive. We travelled on and passed through a small village of about 1,700 women, children and old men.
They that die by famine die by inches.
-Matthew Henry
All of the other men had gone to find food for their livestock. Those left behind were on the brink, waiting and hoping that the men would return with something, or that someone would come and help.
Already 40 of them had died, mostly children. On the outskirts of Marsabit, we met people who had traveled huge distances on very little food or water, all their cattle had died and they needed help. There was a great sense of frustration. These were people willing to work and help themselves. They had tried everything, planting different crops, mixing their herds, but this savage drought has had such a huge impact.
But as bad as things were in Marsabit, we had a huge sense of foreboding that we were about to see a lot worse. The following day we traveled to Dolo in Somalia.
Already 40 of them had died, mostly children. On the outskirts of Marsabit, we met people who had traveled huge distances on very little food or water, all their cattle had died and they needed help. There was a great sense of frustration. These were people willing to work and help themselves. They had tried everything, planting different crops, mixing their herds, but this savage drought has had such a huge impact.
But as bad as things were in Marsabit, we had a huge sense of foreboding that we were about to see a lot worse. The following day we traveled to Dolo in Somalia.
The Death Roads
Our first stop was on the side of the road where a large group of exhausted women and children were settled under some trees. We spoke with Sadia Abdul who had walked most of the way from Birbwell – 200km away! She had left behind conflict and any means of earning an income was gone.
The group was hungry and in desperate need of food and water. Many had the listless look of people who have gone through so much and were nearly too weak to travel further. We saw some truly awful scenes of severely malnourished children, babies with arms no thicker than your finger.
As we entered the village of Dolo there was a reception party of boys and girls singing to welcome Mary Robinson and signs saying how much they appreciated the Irish focus on their plight and hoping that we can make a difference for them.
At the clinic, we saw babies being weighed, measured and checked for malnutrition. Too many babies were small and underweight for their age.
The real worry now is that this is still early in the ‘hunger’ season. Hunger won’t peak until around October and the head of the clinic believed that it could be worse this time around than it was in 1992.
The clinic is overwhelmed. Up to 2,000 people are passing through that clinic every day. Staff work from early in the morning until late at night and people are already queuing when they open. The staff members give high-nutrition food known as plumpy-nut to those children who are most malnourished. But because families have nothing else they share this among themselves. This means no-one gets the proper nutrition.
Sodo Abdulahi Nuh, 25, was having her 14-month-old malnourished baby boy weighed. He registered just 7 kgs on the scale. She has three other children to care for too. Around six children die each week at this very clinic – because they have no food.
I met a woman who had a little baby in her arms – she had eight children and had traveled 50km on foot. Her husband had been killed in fighting in Mogadishu. She had arrived into Dolo not knowing anybody. A local family, who were desperate themselves, brought her in and were doing their best to feed her and her children, sharing the little bit they had. That’s the kind of extraordinary people they are.
Amina had walked 50 kms from Luk with three-year-old daughter, Asha. She had already lost two children. All of her cattle died too.
In Kenya too, families are running out of options. Karagi village, in Turkana, Kenya has buried 40 of its people in the recent past, most of them children, and all due to hunger.
The most striking thing about Karagi is that we didn’t see one man of working age. These men have travelled very long distances to try and find water for their livestock – the only source of income they have. They send back money when they can. The village is entirely comprised of women, children and elderly men who are on the brink of disaster. The sense of foreboding was palpable.
In Marsabit, we heard from 65-year-old Tabich Galgal. He simply said that they have no food. Some members of the community are receiving food aid but they share what they have with others, so everyone is trying to survive on rations.
The group was hungry and in desperate need of food and water. Many had the listless look of people who have gone through so much and were nearly too weak to travel further. We saw some truly awful scenes of severely malnourished children, babies with arms no thicker than your finger.
As we entered the village of Dolo there was a reception party of boys and girls singing to welcome Mary Robinson and signs saying how much they appreciated the Irish focus on their plight and hoping that we can make a difference for them.
At the clinic, we saw babies being weighed, measured and checked for malnutrition. Too many babies were small and underweight for their age.
The real worry now is that this is still early in the ‘hunger’ season. Hunger won’t peak until around October and the head of the clinic believed that it could be worse this time around than it was in 1992.
The clinic is overwhelmed. Up to 2,000 people are passing through that clinic every day. Staff work from early in the morning until late at night and people are already queuing when they open. The staff members give high-nutrition food known as plumpy-nut to those children who are most malnourished. But because families have nothing else they share this among themselves. This means no-one gets the proper nutrition.
Sodo Abdulahi Nuh, 25, was having her 14-month-old malnourished baby boy weighed. He registered just 7 kgs on the scale. She has three other children to care for too. Around six children die each week at this very clinic – because they have no food.
I met a woman who had a little baby in her arms – she had eight children and had traveled 50km on foot. Her husband had been killed in fighting in Mogadishu. She had arrived into Dolo not knowing anybody. A local family, who were desperate themselves, brought her in and were doing their best to feed her and her children, sharing the little bit they had. That’s the kind of extraordinary people they are.
Amina had walked 50 kms from Luk with three-year-old daughter, Asha. She had already lost two children. All of her cattle died too.
In Kenya too, families are running out of options. Karagi village, in Turkana, Kenya has buried 40 of its people in the recent past, most of them children, and all due to hunger.
The most striking thing about Karagi is that we didn’t see one man of working age. These men have travelled very long distances to try and find water for their livestock – the only source of income they have. They send back money when they can. The village is entirely comprised of women, children and elderly men who are on the brink of disaster. The sense of foreboding was palpable.
In Marsabit, we heard from 65-year-old Tabich Galgal. He simply said that they have no food. Some members of the community are receiving food aid but they share what they have with others, so everyone is trying to survive on rations.
The right time to eat is: for a rich man when he is hungry, for a poor man when he has something to eat.
-Mexican Proverb
The frustration in Tabich’s voice was evident as he described how they had tried everything. It’s not that they are not doing all they can to eke out a living, it’s just that the drought has really placed such a huge burden on them, he said.
Then Elena Boru explained how the lack of water is having a devastating effect on women, who have to spend most of the day collecting it.
She explained that there are plenty of people in the village more than willing and able to work, to do anything where they can provide for their families and she stressed that the elderly must be taken care of. Along our travels we saw very feeble and clearly malnourished older people – a shocking prospect considering all they have contributed to their communities during their lives.
Famine has now gripped parts of Somalia. This is the inevitable consequence of drought, climate change, conflict, entrenched poverty and lack of investment in development.
Then Elena Boru explained how the lack of water is having a devastating effect on women, who have to spend most of the day collecting it.
She explained that there are plenty of people in the village more than willing and able to work, to do anything where they can provide for their families and she stressed that the elderly must be taken care of. Along our travels we saw very feeble and clearly malnourished older people – a shocking prospect considering all they have contributed to their communities during their lives.
Famine has now gripped parts of Somalia. This is the inevitable consequence of drought, climate change, conflict, entrenched poverty and lack of investment in development.
Dadaab - The Biggest Refugee Camp In The World
Our next stop was Dadaab in Kenya, the biggest refugee camp in the world.
Flying in you can see the vastness of it. It goes on for miles and miles. It was originally built for 90,000 people but now there’s upwards of 400,000 living there. It’s completely overflowing. Up to 80,000 people are living on the outskirts of the camp.
At one point I was right beside a woman who was hiding her baby who had just died. She was sitting there, just privately mourning. What an extraordinarily terrible thing for any mother to go through.
Her father told us how things had been so very bad for them and the awful thing was, that they had survived their long journey from Somalia but the child died just as they arrived at the camp. It was shockingly sad.
The atmosphere at Dadaab is very hot, dirty, with all these desperate people continuing to stream in, about 9,000 a week. The worst thing that could happen now, in these very built up camps, is that there would be cholera or an outbreak such as that.
Up to 1.75million people are displaced within Somalia itself. The war has been going on for several years and the fact that Somalia
doesn’t have a stable, democratic government is a major factor in the current hardship.
We met a woman who had travelled from Luk in Somalia, 50 km away from the camp. She just had one of her daughters with her, her other two children died on the way. As we were leaving, an old man with a very weak infant came up to me with his hand out. I’ve spent a lot of time in many different countries in Africa, I used to live and work running a health program in South Sudan, in Kenya, The Congo, Rwanda and other places. Nobody ever came up to me with a hand out, it’s not what people here do.
Those are questions that must be addressed, in time, but first we have to deal with this humanitarian crisis. 12 million lives are on the line but if we act right now we can prevent further large-scale loss of life.
Oxfam is working right through the region, providing food, clean water, and shelter, and helping people to earn a living again. Through our programmes we intend to reach three million people.
At the moment, Oxfam is implementing the single largest nutrition programme in the capital city, Mogadishu, treating more than 12,000 severely malnourished children, pregnant women and those who are breastfeeding. We are also providing water and sanitation for 300,000 internally displaced people and giving life-saving equipment to Somalia’s only functioning children’s hospital.
In Kenya and Ethiopia, we are giving people money through cash for work schemes to build water tanks and reservoirs. We are trucking in water supplies for 32,000 people in Ethiopia and treating the water for drinking, cooking, washing and keeping animals alive. We are helping people who have livestock to keep them healthy and vaccinated. We are digging and repairing wells and boreholes, and providing sanitation and latrines.
But we can’t do it alone. We need the help of governments and the public to stop this human catastrophe spreading and claiming greater numbers of lives. Otherwise we are condemning countless thousands of people to a needless death.
Flying in you can see the vastness of it. It goes on for miles and miles. It was originally built for 90,000 people but now there’s upwards of 400,000 living there. It’s completely overflowing. Up to 80,000 people are living on the outskirts of the camp.
At one point I was right beside a woman who was hiding her baby who had just died. She was sitting there, just privately mourning. What an extraordinarily terrible thing for any mother to go through.
Her father told us how things had been so very bad for them and the awful thing was, that they had survived their long journey from Somalia but the child died just as they arrived at the camp. It was shockingly sad.
The atmosphere at Dadaab is very hot, dirty, with all these desperate people continuing to stream in, about 9,000 a week. The worst thing that could happen now, in these very built up camps, is that there would be cholera or an outbreak such as that.
Up to 1.75million people are displaced within Somalia itself. The war has been going on for several years and the fact that Somalia
doesn’t have a stable, democratic government is a major factor in the current hardship.
We met a woman who had travelled from Luk in Somalia, 50 km away from the camp. She just had one of her daughters with her, her other two children died on the way. As we were leaving, an old man with a very weak infant came up to me with his hand out. I’ve spent a lot of time in many different countries in Africa, I used to live and work running a health program in South Sudan, in Kenya, The Congo, Rwanda and other places. Nobody ever came up to me with a hand out, it’s not what people here do.
Those are questions that must be addressed, in time, but first we have to deal with this humanitarian crisis. 12 million lives are on the line but if we act right now we can prevent further large-scale loss of life.
Oxfam is working right through the region, providing food, clean water, and shelter, and helping people to earn a living again. Through our programmes we intend to reach three million people.
At the moment, Oxfam is implementing the single largest nutrition programme in the capital city, Mogadishu, treating more than 12,000 severely malnourished children, pregnant women and those who are breastfeeding. We are also providing water and sanitation for 300,000 internally displaced people and giving life-saving equipment to Somalia’s only functioning children’s hospital.
In Kenya and Ethiopia, we are giving people money through cash for work schemes to build water tanks and reservoirs. We are trucking in water supplies for 32,000 people in Ethiopia and treating the water for drinking, cooking, washing and keeping animals alive. We are helping people who have livestock to keep them healthy and vaccinated. We are digging and repairing wells and boreholes, and providing sanitation and latrines.
But we can’t do it alone. We need the help of governments and the public to stop this human catastrophe spreading and claiming greater numbers of lives. Otherwise we are condemning countless thousands of people to a needless death.
“Hunger is the best pickle.”
-Benjamin Franklin
The total amount required to resolve this crisis is estimated to be €1.9billion. It sounds like a lot of money but it isn’t, not from the whole world. We have spent thousands of billions on shoring up banks and fighting useless wars. Just the Iraq war cost us more than a thousand billion in direct costs. But this is the biggest crisis in the world right now and the world needs to pay attention. I think the most ominous and most frightening thing is that local people believe things are worse than they were in 1992 when hundreds of thousands of people died.
It was my first time in Somalia and it was only afterwards, when I got home and had time to reflect, that I fully realised how desperate things are there and how sad it was witnessing it. I hope to return again and I hope it will be better. Some of the people I met and some of the images I saw will stay with me forever.
It’s just so shocking that this can happen in 2011 – the word famine should have been eradicated because it should be something that happened in our past. The idea it can happen today is abhorrent.
It was my first time in Somalia and it was only afterwards, when I got home and had time to reflect, that I fully realised how desperate things are there and how sad it was witnessing it. I hope to return again and I hope it will be better. Some of the people I met and some of the images I saw will stay with me forever.
It’s just so shocking that this can happen in 2011 – the word famine should have been eradicated because it should be something that happened in our past. The idea it can happen today is abhorrent.
