Over 500,000 people in Mandera face starvation – report

Over 500,000 people in Mandera are facing starvation after three years of failed rains.

The drought situation is growing from bad to worse.

The residents cannot fend for their families after their animals died due to the drought.

Governor Adan Khalif said they are working on emergency response through water trucking and food aid for vulnerable households, together with the National Drought Management Authority and donors.

But with limited resources, they can't do much.

Khalif said the county is currently supplying 1.8 million litres of water to 192 villages daily, saying the number was growing daily. 

“I request President William Ruto to declare the drought a national disaster and initiate measures such as livestock off-take programme by Kenya Meat Commission, releasing grains from the strategic food reserves and monitoring of food supply,” he said.

“We are ready to work with the national government to eradicate food insecurity and reduce the cost of living and hunger-related deaths of our people, their livestock and wild animals.”

Speaking to the press in Mandera on Sunday, the governor said residents are primarily pastoralists and losing livestock due to starvation and drought-related diseases was only making a bad situation worse.

According to the August report from NDMA-Mandera, the high livestock mortality rate is making the food insecurity challenge more severe.

The report said the cumulative livestock deaths in September stand at 365,283 cattle, 160,721 camels, 495,169 goats and sheep and 29,314 donkeys from January to date).

The estimated number of livestock currently in urgent need of supplementary feeds, treatment and water across the county are Cattle 452,724 (60 per cent), Camel 386,448(40 per cent), Goats 1,365,841 (40 per cent), Sheep 333,260 (40 per cent) and Donkeys 105,660 (60 per cent).

The governor said that with schools re-opening, there was a need for urgent contingency measures.

This includes water supply to schools and complementing the food supply to 41 boarding schools and the 312 ECDE centres in the county.

“We need an estimated Sh370 million for this intervention,” he said.

The governor thanked partners who have supported them.

They include NDMA, Racida, Islamic Relief, World Vision, DRC, Kenya Red Cross, Napad, Care International, WFP, UNICEF, Consortium of cooperating partners (COCOP), Action Against Hunger and Save the Children.

He appealed to them to scale up support to help people cope with famine.

Mandera NDMA coordinator Hussein Aretho said the situation might get much worse if the county does not receive the October, November December rains.

“Subsistence farming along River Dawa has also reduced since the water levels have gone down further making the situation worse,” he said.

“Relief food distribution and water trucking are urgently needed.”

Edited by Kiilu Damaris