How we came to live here

I was born here. Our parents moved to this village in the 1970s after a prolonged drought. Our neighbours then the Pokot raided our village and stole the animals that had survived the drought living us with nothing to survive on. This is when they had to move to Kitale.
They were 30 families when they moved from Lodwar to Kitale and were settled in Machinjoni (near the slaughter house). This was a dumping ground for the town. They settled here because it was near the slaughter house where at times they would get scraps of meat off skins and hides or even at times get calves to raise and eat.
As our population increased, we remained poor and only relying on the hand-outs we were getting from the slaughter house. Life was difficult. Our parents could not educate us. We ended up in Kitale town as vulnerable street boys and girls.
The challenges we were facing
Our houses were made of waste plastic bags. Women continued to fend for their families through prostitution. The youth unable to make ends meet were desperate. Some ended up in criminal activities. We have lived like this here since the ‘70s.
In 1984, a cholera outbreak caused many to die. Many families then were left un-headed. Children were orphaned. Some of the families were swept under the scourge while others were left with single little children who ended up in town to pick from the dumps and garbage heaps. Even those who died were buried near the settlement. And the situation was worsened by the fact that the area was a dumping ground for all sorts of things.
One day our neighbour collected a well wrapped package in the dump. Thinking that it was a valuable item she sneaked it to her house only to find that it was an aborted baby that had been dumped in the bin. She was very shocked. We were wondering whether we were Kenyan’s or are we refugees from another country.
The smell in the village owing to poor sanitation practices was so bad that every time you wished that you went out of the village and in to town other than be in the village. (She comics – if you do not get fresh air you will always be thin).
We pleaded with the council mayor then to stop the council trucks from dumping waste at the site as it had become an unhealthy ground. Later the Director of Social Services fronted the cause and the dumping was stopped. The population of remaining members of Kipsongo continued to increase.

Sadly...

I had to enquire about my friends and those whom I had interacted with 6 years ago. Almost all the women I talked to in Kipsongo had lost their husbands. Some had been jailed; others had succumbed to HIV/AIDS; others had just disappeared. The lucky ones had returned to Turkana after promises of restitution by family members. The young men and women whom we had worked with in the past during our previous project had moved out of Kipsongo and were either wagers, doing all sorts of odd jobs in Kitale or especially the girls engaged in prostitution. Those who remained in the village were desperate.
This continued to demonstrate to me the consistent and deliberate attempt by the Kitale society to associate these internally displaced pastoralists of Kipsongo with all manner of ills and so everyone has trampled on their freedom and rights with impunity.

How it all started

Pastoralists from Turkana and Pokot in Northern Kenya moved to Kitale in search for an alternative means of survival and a better life owing to drought, famine and conflict over scarce natural resources thirty-eight years ago. These nomadic tribes had been forced out of pastoralism and had now been forced to Kitale, an urban lifestyle, without any trade or urban survival skills.
With nowhere to go they settled on the Municipal Council’s dumping sites in the town. At first they lived near a slaughter house (Machinjoni), but later they had to be moved. Cholera had struck the residents as a result of poor sanitary practices. The water sources at the site had been contaminated as a result of heavy rainfall. They were later settled in Kipsongo which means the "Place of the Dogs." This was going to be their home. Currently, more than 2,500 people (about 300 households) live on the 6.5 acres of land. The number currently stands at a population of about 13,450.
The poverty levels of Kipsongo are extreme. The living conditions are desperate. On arrival I actually thought the residents were not Kenyans until they showed me their identification documents (IDs). They even voted in the last election, they told me. The sitting Member of Parliament lives near the neighbourhood. But yet, Kipsongo remains forgotten; the residents desperate, sad and desolate. They are known as beggars in Kitale town. They are associated with societal evils including criminal activities, drugs and underage prostitution. The refugees were given jobs as cattle herders before slaughter while they raised the calves of expectant cows. This in addition to the free meat, milk and local liquor were quite appealing.
Their houses are made out of intertwined trees-branch twigs and covered with waste plastic bags. During the rain the plastic bags fill with water and being too heavy for the twig frame cause the huts to collapse under the weight. Other times, they would accidentally catch fire and the highly combustible structure would cause destruction even on to other houses in the raging flare. The community members still mourn many of their own as a result of such accidents.
As rare and as distant as it is, firewood is the main source of energy in this village. The residents have to walk to Mount Elgon forest to fetch it, an activity that is labour intensive besides being illegal. Those who then sell it have to contend with the fact that the cost will be too high for the residents hence not make much if at all. In the end all the residents in this village end up in the dumpsites within the town in search of food.
I was also told that the Municipal Council of Kitale had not recognised this settlement. When I verified this, a council officer told me that, it had wanted to resettle the residents of Kipsongo on a patch of land in Kitalale, 17Km from the town.
“This was very far,” said an old villager in Kipsongo.
“We are manual labourers and we always rely on the town for our daily lives. Taking us away from Kipsongo is as good as killing us.”
Basic service provision, the prerogative of the council, that should be rightfully provided to all the residents of Kitale is visibly lacking. There are no water or sanitation facilities in Kipsongo. Solid waste from upmarket residential areas of Kitale is still dumped in the region they settle. They are unable to pronounce the good they have seen since settling in the village. None of the residents in the slum has a legal document of ownership on the land. Recently the residents have been put on an eviction notice because their 35-year settlement has been sold to a private developer to construct an ultra-modern residential facility!
To date the sight of the residents of Kipsongo is associated with poverty but for how long? And there is nowhere to turn but rely on their lifestyle – fetch from what everyone has thrown away.

Kitale Diary

17th August 2011
When we left for Kitale I knew I was going to meet my old acquaintances and friends and even probably share in their excitement since the last time I had met them. The road from Kisumu is remarkably improved. The distance seems to have been reduced because they are done well. The towns along the road are well serviced and I was not disappointed. However, during the two-and-a-half hour drive, it was the good thoughts of the people I had spent time with in Kitale that were flowing through my mind and neither the landscape nor smooth roads. I knew we had started a good thing with this community and I was certain that they had flown with it.
Practical Action had worked with communities to help them develop Strategic Ward Action Plans, a process that had integrated participation at its core. This would assist communities in identifying where to source for resources and be at the fore front of their own development. This would include direct and decentralised government and international development funds and resources. We helped communities to choose the right technologies in order to develop infrastructure that is both well sustained and managed. In the end we envisaged reaching about 60,000 residents in Kitale through providing adequate water and sanitation facilities, waste generation and recycling technologies and identification of economic opportunities.
I was certain that if this was true, then the new on-going project People’s Plans in to Practice (PPP) would definitely be scaling up a good thing. I was anxious throughout the journey to the agricultural town of Kitale. What would I see the following day?