“Speaking of the brutal and criminally organized hunger of East Africa…” –Keinaan Warsame, NYT
On September 29, three members of Trent’s international community gave a talk about the famine in East Africa due to a drought this summer. The talk was part of the World First Colloquium, which will be hosting talks about international issues by international students all year.
Each country had unique problems dealing with the drought and subsequent famine and each speaker had a unique way of framing the problems and positing solutions.
Rishad Kabar, a first year Chemical Physics major from Mombasa, spoke about Kenya.
Hana Mohamed, who has a degree from Trent in Politics, taught English in the Czech Republic before working with Kings College Hospital in London. She continued to go home to Somalia to teach throughout her education, so she spoke about her experiences in that country.
Nejat Abdella, a fourth year International Development Studies student, interned with African Humanitarian Action this summer in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. AHA is a non-governmental organization that has offices in over 17 African nations and specializes in refugee centres and repatriation efforts. AHA boasts “African solutions to African problems”.
Only some regions in Kenya has been affected by the drought, largely due to its geography and infrastructure.2.4 million Kenyans are starving and are “not only battling hunger, but battling diseases,” Rishad said. Rishad posited that the problem is more geographical than political, but “in my opinion, the government isn’t doing enough to feed people.” Kenya has one of the most corrupt governments in the world, according to Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index. Due to this corruption, the Kenyan dollar is the second-worst performing in the world. The country does not have the infrastructure to get food out to the remote areas that need it.
“I felt that the government just sat back and watched,” Rishad said of Mwai Kibaki, ignoring the “ominous signs of Climate Change and weather predictions.” The simple solutions that do not even touch on the corruption issues in Kenya are to develop infrastructure to get food to remote areas as well as unify Kenyans by reducing tribalism. And the best piece of advice Rishad had for Kenya that every nation should listen to: subsidize farmers!
The worst famine in decades pillages the flesh of the already wounded in Somalia, and the world’s collective humanitarian response has been a defeated shrug. If ever there was a best and worst time to return home, it was now. –Keinaan Warsame, The New York Times
Somalia is used to droughts. December to March is the Jilal, the harshest of the dry season. Gu, which lasts from April to June, is the wet season. This cycle of wet to dry is predictable, but the intensity of this year’s Jilal was not as predictable. It is the worst drought to occur in 60 years. Tens of thousands of people have died and many more are malnourished.
On July 20, 2011, the UN supersized Somalia’s food crisis to a famine. Unfortunately, famine brings about power shifts and struggles in Somalia. Mohamad argued that famine is man-made in Somalia because there is a vast traditional knowledge of seasons and growing techniques to draw upon.
After World War II, Britain held not only their British Somaliland, but Italian Somaliland too, until, after years of negotiations with local political groups, Somalia gained its independence. A coup in 1969 brought with it a new socialist regime lead by Mohamed Said Barre. The socialist government suspended the constitution and dissolved parliament. The government controlled everything, but literacy rates (urban and rural) soared due to public education.
“Your tribe is as important as your postal code” in Somalia, according to Mohamad. By appealing to the tribal nature of the country and the totalitarian nature of the socialist regime, Ethiopia’s communist Derg supported local militias to overthrow the government. During this civil war, there was a massive exodus from the country, especially the capital city, Mogadishu. Until 2005, tribal leaders would meet with each other under a tree to decide upon things and war lords would terrorize the streets of Mogadishu. But in 2005, a famine led to the formation of the Islamic Courts.
The Islamic Courts asked the UN for assistance in January and did not receive it until July. “The problem was getting the food to the people.” Mohamad continued to explain that the militia of the Islamic Courts, Al-Shabab, “refused to have women work in southern Somalia,” blocked assistance, or just kept it for themselves. Unlike Kenya and Ethiopia, the famine in Somalia is an urban problem. Independent farmers see the price of wheat soaring and secure their food supply as a precautionary measure to a well-foreseen phenomena.
In Addis Ababa, some people do not even know that there is a famine going on. Media awareness is minimal and food is plentiful. The problem is perceived as a rural problem. Abdella reiterated that the dry spells in Ethiopia are also well-foreseen and the government of Ethiopia prepared “buffer stops,” or stored food. Although Ethiopia was able to deal with the drought a bit better, the influx of Somali refugees is difficult to deal with.
The African Humanitarian Action built 300 shelters this summer for victims of starvation. Most of the assistance they asked for was spent on non-food related items needed for shelters, such as blankets, pillows, and mosquito nets. AHA also participated in the Inter Agency Standing Committee where all of the UN agencies (and some NGOs) got together to solve some problems surrounding the famine. “It was one of the most sad things I’ve seen in my life[…] all talk and no action”, Abdella said of the conference. “The money is not coming; it’s always tied up in bureaucracy.” Since there is no money, the relief shelters are overrun with people and on top of the lack of supplies and starvation, there was an outbreak of Cholera.
For Abdella, money is the only thing East Africans need from the West. The solutions to the problems are there, it’s just that the people with the money to do something in East Africa are too corrupt to contribute. Nejat posits that it is “non-traditional” donors that can really have an effect. Countries like America and continents like Europe need to stop being the only source of aid.
