Agencies give relief food to over 500 Kilifi residents

More than 500 residents of Palakumi and Dungicha in Ganze, Kilifi County on Wednesday received relief food and water donated by Direct Aid-Kenya and African Muslim Agency (Ama).

At the first event that took place at Palakumi chief’s office in Mtsangamali Village, more than 300 locals received maize and wheat flour, sugar and rice.

Three in each family received 12 kilogrammes of maize, wheat flour, rice and cooking oil.

Addressing the locals, Direct Aid-Kenya director, Dr Ismael Hussein, said the relief food was donated to the villagers by the Kuwaiti government.

“We are here today in one of our programmes to distribute relief food to drought-stricken people in the country. We are targeting regions that have been hardly hit by hunger because of prolonged drought,” he said.

Kilifi County has an estimated 1.2 million people and has of late been battling hunger occasioned by prolonged drought.

200,000 FACE HUNGER

Both the county and national governments have been sending relief food to more than 200,000 people facing starvation.

Dr Ismael said the organisation has been distributing relief food in Mandera, Isiolo, Garissa and many other regions in Kenya besides offering the services to more than 30 countries in Africa.

THANKED DONORS

Residents who received the relief food thanked Direct Aid and Ama and said more mitigation measures should be done to avert any human suffering as a result of the drought.

“I am very happy to have received this food. Things are very hard in this region. We have gone without food for over a year and we depend on relief food,” said Jullius Thuva, a resident of Darajani Village.

Another resident, Harry Dogo, from Palakumi Village, said it has been very tough going without food in the region because of drought but said with the relief food, things will be better.

“I know this will take me for two to three days. It has been very difficult here but with this relief food, things will be fine,” he said.