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Internally displaced people camping at the Eldoret Showground.
The camp has over 13,000 people. Photo/JARED NYATAYA
The Waki Commission on post-election violence was on Wednesday putting final touches to its report as it emerged that over 80,000 people who were affected were still languishing in camps around the country.
And at least 220,000 others were still living on doles from the Kenya Red Cross, in their homes and refugee camps spread around the country.
Details on the status of the uprooted people comes a day after former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan who brokered the peace accord singled it out as one of the foremost outstanding issues to be resolved.
He was in the country to receive the Kriegler report and meet with President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga and issued a statement on his departure on Monday.
Solution
The statement said in part: “The situation of IDPs is on the minds of virtually all Kenyans I met. A durable solution must be found expeditiously.”
Members of the Commission of Inquiry on Post-election Violence headed by Mr Justice Philip Waki remained holed up at a retreat in South Coast and promised the report would be handed to President Kibaki even before the October 15 deadline.
And the Nation received from the Government and the Red Cross details of the status of internally displaced people in the country, the Kenyans who paid a heavy price following the disputed presidential results that precipitated mayhem.
The focus shifted from Kriegler report that analysed the flawed electoral process, which was released last week to the Waki commission.
The secretary George Kegoro declared: “We have enough evidence to recommend measures to prevent the country from witnessing the violence it did after the 2007 elections”.
Hundreds of displaced people blocked Prime Minister Raila Odinga’s motorcade in Kisumu and demanded audience.
Raila drove into placard-waving IDPs outside the Tom Mboya Labour College on Monday evening, as he left a conference on male circumcision.
Unknown to the PM, the IDPs had been waiting for him outside the college from 2pm.
They claimed they had been sidelined in the Government’s ‘Operation Rudi Nyumbani’ programme.
Attempts by Raila aides to make him evade the IDPs failed as they monitored his every movement. His driver tried to drive off but the IDPs blocked the road.
Raila then came out of his limousine to thunderous cheers.
He asked them in Dholuo: “Un jomage? (Who are you?) They responded in unison: “IDPs!”
Neglected….
]]>- Children have turned to scavenging, while girls and women are trading sex for food.
- Men from the camp and from outside preying on girls because of their vulnerability
- Most families can only afford a cup of light porridge a day.
- Danger of contracting diseases at the camp as a result of overflowing toilets
Children have turned to scavenging, while girls and women are trading sex for food.That is what is left of the Nakuru Showground camp for the displaced, after Kenya Red Cross Society withdrew from where it had been feeding more than 14,000 uprooted people….