Alert

Kenya - No. 49/2008

Somali refugee influx to Dadaab

Geneva, 10 December 2008

Since March 2008, there has been an influx of refugees in the Dadaab camps in the northeastern part of Kenya due to the deteriorating security, socioeconomic and humanitarian situation inside Somalia. In just under a year, more than 56,000 new arrivals have been registered leading to a serious crisis with lack of land and plots to settle the new arrivals, lack of essential non-food items (NFIs) and overstretching of existing protection and assistance capacities of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and the Kenyan Government in all sectors - water and sanitation, shelter, health and nutrition, education, registration and general protection and security of refugees.

Minimum standards for the provision of essential services have deteriorated as a result of the influx. Most of the new arrivals have not been allocated land following the filling of all available space by August 2008, and they have no shelter. New arrivals are settled with relatives and those without relatives are out in the open under trees and around the offices, compromising their safety and health. Camp management standards been severely affected as a result of land use violations such as congestion and encroachments at a pace LWF is unable to prevent or manage at current capacity. These violations pose a great danger with increased potential of fire and disease outbreaks. Environmental impacts of uncontrolled settlement, increased incidences of disputes and conflict over land, and increased insecurity all impact negatively on the protection of refugees, particularly the vulnerable elderly, chronically ill, pregnant and lactating women, and young children. The current refugee population in the three camps is 228,806 (females 111,444; males 117,362).

The UN agencies led by UNHCR, Kenyan Government and implementing NGOs have recently concluded a contingency planning exercise in which possible scenarios for 2009 have been identified. Each of these partners is tasked to respond in sectors within their mandate. Discussions are at an advanced level for the Government of Kenya to allocate land for the fourth camp in Dadaab. A donor briefing was recently organized by UNHCR and the World Food Programme (WFP) at Nairobi to highlight the plight of Somali refugees at Dadaab camps. There is therefore an inter-agency effort to mitigate further negative impacts on the existing refugees and on the newly arriving asylum seekers.

With support from ACT appeal (AFKE73) and other bilateral funding, LWF has been coordinating assistance for new arrivals, overseeing camp layout management, demarcating and issuing plots to new refugees, improving roads to enhance accessibility and safety, and coordinating refugee self management and governance in camps. Due to the current and foreseeable situation, LWF requests for continued support, and the ACT Kenya Forum (December 2008 meeting) has supported this recommendation.

LWF plans to respond to this emergency by assisting asylum seekers from Somalia at Dadaab refugee camps in Kenya through the following ways:

• Conduct social assessments and provision of most essential NFIs to vulnerable new arrivals

• Provision of emergency shelter to new arrivals

• Support in the process of surveying, demarcating and planning for the fourth camp (which is almost secured) and other camps depending on the number of new arrivals and land allocation by the Government of Kenya

• Coordinate site plans management, roads improvement and decongestion in the overcrowded sections of existing camps and in the new camps

• Orientation and induction of new arrivals to camp management structures and mechanisms so as to minimize conflict between new arrivals and old refugees as well as with the host community

LWF Kenya proposes to prepare an Appeal to respond to this unfolding situation in 2009.

Any funding indication or pledge should be communicated to Jessie Kgoroeadira, ACT Finance Officer (jkg@act-intl.org).

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ACT is a global alliance of churches and related agencies working to save lives and support communities in emergencies worldwide. The ACT Coordinating Office is based with the World Council of Churches (WCC) and The Lutheran World Federation (LWF) in Switzerland.