In recent months international aid groups have been sounding the alarm on the worsening humanitarian crisis facing Somali refugees in northern Kenya. On March 27 2009, Richard Lough of Reuters reported that “Somali refugees in Kenya face humanitarian emergency” with over 250 000 people living in Dadaab northern Kenya and thousands more expected due to the worsening security situation in Somalia. According to Lough, Oxfam’s assessment of the camp exposed “a serious public health crisis caused by a lack of basic services, severe overcrowding and a chronic lack of funding"
The Problems at the Dadaab Refugee Camp
Joyce Mulama of Inter Press Service in the March 31 2009 article “Kenya: Refugees Suffering in Camps” refers to a new Human Rights Watch (HRW) report that accuses the Kenyan police of a serious abuses against Somali asylum seekers. The HRW report entitled From Horror to Hopelessness: Kenya's Forgotten Somali Refugee Crisis claims mistreatment of refugees has increased since the Kenya- Somali border was closed in 2007 following a move to oust an insurgent group by Ethiopian forces. In an apparent rebuttal of the HRW accusations, the deputy police spokesperson, Charles Owino, was quoted by IPS as saying “If there are any references out there of police manhandling people, let them be brought to us. We have not received any complaints. How can we react to rumours?"
The Dadaab refugee camp is one of the largest camps in the world. Furthermore, Kenya, despite its own internal difficulties, has an acclaimed history of hosting of refugees thus making the current accusations all the more disturbing. In a March 27 2009 report “Somalia: Thousands Still Fleeing to Kenya, Reports UN Agency” the United Nations News service noted that notwithstanding the establishment of a new government in Somalia, thousands of people are fleeing to Kenya with 20,000 people registered at Dadaab since the beginning of 2009.
In the article “Kenya: UN Concerned Over Country’s Forcible Return of Somali Asylum Seekers” that was published on the April 3rd 2009 by the UN News Service, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) “expressed its concern over the increasing trend by Kenyan authorities to forcibly Somali asylum seekers back to their war-torn nation.” It noted a March 31 incident where 31 refugees- mostly women and children were sent back to Somalia upon arriving at the camp in Dadaab. The UNHCR has made a formal protest to the Kenyan Minister of Immigration and Registration against these forced returns.
Lough points out that the Somali conflict “has killed more than 17,000 civilians since the start of 2007, one million more have been driven from their homes and about a third of the population - more than 3 million people - need emergency food aid. “
Easing the Growing Kenyan Refugee Crisis
This fragile situation is still evolving and needs continuous international monitoring. However, there needs to be political will on the part of the international community to intervene if the Kenyan government fails to improve its treatment of its refugees. It is well established that the reports of abuses are contrary to International Refugee law as well as Kenyan law. Therefore, the Kenyan government has to hold the officials breaking the law to account. In lieu of appropriate action on the part of the Kenyan State the international community has to hold the Kenyan government to account for their failure to meet their obligations.
Odilile Ayodele - Odilile Ayodele is a self-starter, strategic thinker with a Master of Arts degree in International Relations from the University of the ...
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