As Clinton visits Kenya, thousands of Somali refugees forced to flee there continue to face hard times
3 August 2009
![](/typo3temp/pics/b4771bc77f.jpg ""During the heavy rains, those families who don't have a proper house get soaked through and develop health problems," says refugee leader Kassim Sheik Mohammud. "Some of us have lived here for 18 years. We are not expecting luxury, just the basics."")
![](/typo3temp/pics/654df19707.jpg "Eighteen-year-old Iftin Mohamed dropped out of school when she was just ten or eleven. (Although school is free, families say they have to provide materials like notebooks and pens.) Iftin now has a ten-month old daughter, Magal, who's been struggling to get over an infection. // Iftin says daily life in Dadaab for a mother isn’t easy: "The food is not enough here in the camp and sometimes there's a long line for water. It's okay now because it's rainy season but in the dry season there's rationing. At that time, you can go and line up in the morning and you don't leave until the afternoon." // Iftin is enrolled on the IRC's feeding programme for pregnant women and lactating mothers. The nutritious food supplements she receives keep her and her baby healthy. The IRC currently helps around 2,000 women with these food supplements, plus oil and sugar.")
![](/typo3temp/pics/3917453a7e.jpg "Mohamed Yusuf was beaten on the back of his knee by a soldier during his journey from Kismayo in Somalia to Dadaab. "The soldier used the back of his gun against my knee and I've had problems walking ever since," says Mohamed. "It's become worse and now I can't walk without crutches. Can you believe that, although now I'm a refugee sitting here in Dadaab, in Somalia I used to teach biology at the university!" // (Mohamed is pictured with a young boy he's been caring for after the youth became separated from his parents while escaping Somalia.)")
![](/typo3temp/pics/9811d98a10.jpg "Dahir Mohamed is 15 and comes from Kismayo in Somalia. Dahir says: "My father died in the fighting – he wasn't a soldier, our village was attacked. I also lost my mother during the civil war and I don't know where she is. // "I came to the camp in 2006. I travelled with other people and we saw a lot of problems between Somalia and Kenya. If I asked the people I was with for food, they beat me and made me carry their heavy luggage. My kidneys are still paining me because of this. I have visited the IRC hospital but they still hurt. It's hard to walk on the sand. // "I stay with foster parents now. I go to school most days if I am not feeling bad because of my kidneys."")
![](/typo3temp/pics/3848eda585.jpg "International Rescue Committee (IRC) nurse Christine Simiyu treats a baby boy who has been rushed via ambulance to the hospital in Hagadera, Dadaab, after suffering convulsions. She's taken blood tests and is now putting him on a quinine drip for suspected malaria. // "The paediatrics ward is always very busy, especially as more and more refugees keep arriving," says nurse Simiyu. "We are doing our best but the truth is that occasionally the number of patients is just too high – today we have 33 children and only 27 beds."")
All photos by The IRC/Joanne Offer, except the final photo, by the IRC/Mark Muinde. (Click the middle of a picture to enlarge and read the captions...)
Kenya is the first stop on US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s whistle-stop tour of Africa this week. But once there she'll also be discussing conditions in neighbouring Somalia – a country still wracked by piracy, intense fighting between government and anti-government forces, and severe drought.
Indeed, hundreds of thousands of Somali refugees have poured across the border into Kenya. More than 280,000 now live in Dadaab camp alone. And, while they have found the security that eluded them at home, their living conditions are far from ideal.
Dadaab camp was actually designed to house just 90,000 people, so today it's massively congested. A lack of land and funding means that new arrivals don't get their own plot and are forced to share with relatives or erect makeshift shelters wherever there is space.
"During the heavy rains, those families who don't have a proper house get soaked through and develop health problems," says refugee leader Kassim Sheik Mohammud. "Some of us have lived here for 18 years. We are not expecting luxury, just the basics."
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