5.2 Stop of slums

The capital of Kenya – Nairobi has approx. 4 million inhabitants. More that 70 % of these people live in slum areas. The number of slums and number of people living in slums increases by 6 % every year. During the last 10 years the number of people in the slums of Nairobi has doubled. A similar situation in other big Kenyan cities, e.g. Kisumu. In slums people mostly live without access to clean drinking water, health care, without electricity, sewerage system and without access to education. To get minimum financial recourses for basic living is often a problem. Typhoid fever, cholera, AIDS, pneumonia, malaria and other diseases together with insufficient and inaccessible health care cause high human mortality, especially in the working age. The result is a large number of orphans who are then brought up by relatives or neighbours. These people usually have a lot of their own children, and to care for their own children as well as orphans often become a problem for them.

In 2005 there were between 1,6 – 1,8 million orphans living in Kenya (approx. 6 % of all Kenyan population). As the family links in slum areas are often broken, contrary to rural areas where the family bonds are very strong, there is nobody to take care of the children in slums. These disadvantaged children then become street children.

The slum areas extend due to arrival of new people from the countryside to the cities. These people come in search for improving their living standard, in search of education, they are attracted to the western lifestyle, entertainment, in some case they are accused of witchery in the countryside. If they do not succeed in the city, they become one of many inhabitants of the slums of Nairobi.

People living in the rural areas in Kenya are usually not informed about the situation in slums in big Kenyan cities. They leave the countryside with distorted pictures and ideas about the life in Nairobi or other cities. Considering the nearly 50 % unemployment these people do not have a big chance to find a job in the city and avoid the life in a slum.

Stop Slums project will inform the people from the countryside about the situation in the slums, and will show them a real picture of Nairobi through the medium of travelling photo exhibitions. The photos were taken in different slums in Nairobi and Kisumu. The target group consist of young people between 15 – 30 years old who will be addressed by means of leaflets as well as school children, i.e. those who will solve their living situation in the future. The exhibition will be followed by workshops where the people will have a chance to learn more about this topic. The project will concentrate on the regions where the people migrating to Nairobi and Kisumu mostly come from.

However, the awareness about the real life in city slums alone will not create any solution for the rural people living in very difficult conditions. Therefore the people will be offered an alternative in the form of micro credits which will help them to start their own business (in agriculture, handicrafts and trade) and thus also create new job opportunities.