Madonna's tweet sparks varying views of Kibera slum

Kibera residents unnerved by heavy rainfall. Facts like its population, the available amenities and crime rates often depend on who you ask and what interest they have in the area. FILE PHOTO

What you need to know:

  • For instance, the 2009 census revealed there were 170,070 residents in the slum while various Non-Governmental Organisations have been putting the population at more than one million.
  • On its part, the government has tried interventions such as building highrise apartments in Kibera and relocating families there to keep them from leaving in shanties.

If Kibera could speak, it could have long questioned why there are so many differing reports about it, some grossly exaggerated to whip up donors’ emotions.

Facts like its population, the available amenities and crime rates often depend on who you ask and what interest they have in the area.

For instance, the 2009 census revealed there were 170,070 residents in the slum while various Non-Governmental Organisations have been putting the population at more than one million.

The Kibera conversation was stirred by the past week’s Kenyan visit by American pop icon Madonna Ciccone.

One of the pictures she posted on Twitter drew sharp emotions as it bordered on publishing material to elicit sympathy among people of a higher socio-economic class.

It depicted a garbage-dotted trench with a filthy liquid, which she said was the source of the residents’ water.

“Imagine this is where your water comes from!” she tweeted to her 1.2 million followers.

Self-styled Kibera ambassador Octopizzo, a rapper, was particularly incensed, writing an instagram post that blasted Madonna’s notion that “we drink water from mtaro (trench)”.

“Next time do your research before you disrespect a whole community like that,” wrote Octopizzo, who is also running initiatives to support Kibera residents.

But there was something more in Madonna’s post that could perhaps tell the motivation behind it.

After the sentence on where the water comes from, she wrote: “@shofco is working to change this in Kibera, Africa’s largest slum.”

She was referring to the Shining Hope for Communities (Shofco), one of the tens of NGOs in Kibera that is run by activist Kennedy Odede and his wife Posner.

Mr Odede did not want to be drawn into the debate.

“We have no comment to make. However, we would like to invite you, and we also invite Octopizzo to visit Shofco to come and see for yourself the challenges that people face so that you can write a more balanced and informed story,” Mr Odede said in a statement.

COLLIDING STATEMENTS
American writer Nicholas Kristof, in a 2015 post on the organisation’s website, said: “Kibera has no power, running water or public schools and 15 per cent of young girls have been raped or sexually abused before pre-school age.”

After a protest on misrepresentation of facts by Kibra MP Ken Okoth, the two-time Pulitzer award winner edited the statement.

Mr Kristof included some of those perceptions in a book titled A Path Appears: Transforming Lives, Creating Opportunity. He wrote that the toilet-to-people ratio in Kibera is 1:1,300.

Former Information Permanent Secretary Bitange Ndemo, in a March 2015 commentary, said the figures were made up.

“Like many people before the census data came out to confirm the Kibera population, Kristof was largely relying on guess work that later could be mistaken for exaggeration,” wrote Prof Ndemo.

One example could arguably be an organisation called Lunchbowl that is running an online fundraising campaign to help Kibera residents.

“Due to many men still not using condoms and the availability of chang’aa, many girls become pregnant, at any one time about 50 per cent of girls aged 16 to 25 are pregnant. Most of these pregnancies are unwanted, resulting in many cases of abortion. This can be very dangerous, particularly in such a poor area as Kibera,” says a message on Lunchbowl’s website.

The contradicting figures and information about Kibera were the subject of an investigative story titled The missing millions of Kibera published in 2012 by London-based paper the Guardian, which was widely shared among Kenyans in the past week.

Martin Robbins, the article writer, questioned the different Kibera population figures quoted by various bodies, among them the White House, the BBC, Jambo Volunteers, Global Angels, Kibera Tours, Shofco and Kibera Foundation. He wondered why most of them said it was a million-plus.

“The mythical million comes from estimates that have spread over the years like Chinese whispers through the NGO community and later, the internet,” he said.

PERSISTENT PROBLEMS
In Prof Ndemo’s opinion, a number of NGOs that operate in Kibera are guilty of pocketing the money meant for the poor.

“If every shilling raised to alleviate poverty in Kibera were to be used for its intended purpose, every one of the close to 400,000 residents will be on a comfortable monthly salary for at least five years,” he wrote.

A report by an American think tank put the number of NGOs working in Kibera by 2006 at 71.

The report pointed out that in the course of carrying out the study, “considerable overlap and duplication of efforts among organisations was revealed”.

With many aid agencies in the slum purporting to address social issues, why do the same problems — inadequate housing, improper waste disposal, hungry families, and disease — continue plaguing Kibera?

Prof Karuti Kanyinga, a development expert says the problem lies with the government.

“Organisations can only provide ‘software’ if the government has already put the ‘hardware’ in place. NGOs can, for example, provide teachers for a school that the government has built,” he says.

He says housing problem specifically, is one that will continue to haunt Kibera because the people do not hold title deeds to the land they occupy.

On its part, the government has tried interventions such as building highrise apartments in Kibera and relocating families there to keep them from leaving in shanties.

While one would think that a proper four walls, running water in taps and electricity would be irresistible for somebody who has lived in shanties, the reality is that families relocated to the modern apartments rent out the apartment to third parties and move back to the slum.

“This happens because the government is out of touch with the socio-cultural realities of these people,” says Kanyinga.