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Poor stewardship leads to human rights abusesBy Cathy MajtenyiScene 1: Aerial photographs of the Mau Forest complex of western Kenya, published in a March edition of The East African, show a land green and lush, home to streams that feed into a network of rivers and lakes. These photographs, however, may soon be all that is left of this and other forests following the Kenyan government's recent de-gazetting of 167,000 acres contained within 14 forests across the country. The government says it is merely defining the areas already settled by squatters; opponents say this is yet another instance of land-grabbing by the rich and powerful.Scene 2: A white, sandy beach in the Mombasa area delights the eye from a distance. However, an up-close stroll along that beach reveals some very disturbing eyesores: plastic bottles, refuse, metal scrap. This was some of the 13 metric tonnes of inorganic waste that was collected last year by the International Coastal Clean-up exercise, according to an October 2000 report by coordinator David Olendo. More than 3,000 volunteers collected garbage deposited on 5,000 kilometres of coastline from Lamu to Kwale. Olendo calls for “urgent measures” to control waste disposal in coastal areas, otherwise, the marine ecosystem will be destroyed. Scene 3: Lynching, rioting, and other forms of violence continue to plague residents of Umoja II, Kayole, and Komarock estates in Nairobi as battles over who actually owns the 818-acre stretch of land continue. Eight people have been killed in these clashes over the past two years, and the violence shows no sign of abating. The latest fighting, which took place in February of this year, was between supporters of Member of Parliament David Mwenje and members of the Kiambu Dandora Farmers' Company. Mwenje has papers to show that the land belongs to the government, while the farmers claim to have the original title deed. Although occurring in different parts of Kenya, these scenes are faucets of a common reality: direct or indirect misuse of the land – which goes against principles of environmental stewardship as outlined in the Bible – leads to a wide range of abuses that deny Kenyans their basic human rights. Unjust relartionships increase povertyFor Otieno Ombok, constitution and land coordinator at Chemchemi Ya Ukweli (Wellspring of Truth), an ecumenical, human rights non-government organization, one of the most serious violations of the environment in Kenya today is the unjust distribution of land and its resources. “Why are people poor today, given that in Genesis, God created everything first and then human beings followed?” he says. “We were given land that had everything, that was very rich land. Why now are some people poor?“Poverty is the result of unjust relationships,” says Ombok. “We believe in the sanctity and dignity of life.” Without access to land, he says, it is virtually impossible for people to get loans, good shelter, and a supply of food and water for their families, basic needs that everyone is entitled to. The “four traditional pillars of the spirituality of Christianity” – a belief in one God, justice for all, the option for the poor, and self-giving love – should guide how humans treat the environment and its resources and how land is distributed, says Ombok. The government's de-gazetting of the forests is a prime example of how the private allocation and misuse of rich land will make the majority of Kenyans very poor. The area in question is home to Kenya's five principle water catchment areas; the network of rivers and lakes found in the area directly provide the livelihoods for more than two million people, according to the 1989 population census. As reported in a recent issue of The East African, experts at the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) warn that, if the land is parceled out and cleared as planned, Lake Nakuru and most of Kenya's rivers will dry up, worsening the already severe water shortages in urban and rural areas. “Kenya is heading for an ecological disaster, which is due to the mismanagement of our environment especially through deforestation,” Prof. Wangari Maathai, head of the environmental non-government advocacy organization Green Belt Movement, said at a mid-February demonstration opposing the excisions. She attributed Kenya's increasing droughts, crop failures, famines, and subsequent poverty to a loss of forest cover. She said that experts recommend that a country have at least 10 percent of its landmass under forest cover; Kenya has less than two percent. Also, a century ago, Mount Kenya had seven glaciers, while now there are only two. “We, the current generation of Kenyans, have an inter-generational responsibility to prevent further environmental degradation, especially through deforestation and excision of forests,” she said. “It is against our national interests and that of our children.” And Kenyans are experiencing the end result of this degradation. The government's June 2000 poverty reduction paper says that more than 50 percent of all Kenyan households regardless of income do not have access to safe drinking water. For most people in the informal settlements of Nairobi, safe drinking water is just a dream. The raping of the earthNairobi's informal settlements also reflect the end result of the unjust land distribution that Ombok was referring to. According to Jane Weru, executive director of Pamoja Trust, a non-profit trust organization that advocates for the rights of slum dwellers, 55 percent of Nairobi's population lives in informal settlements found on one percent of the residential land area. In a city of approximately 2.5 million, that amounts to just over one million people who live in places such as Mathare, Korogocho, and Kibera. The United Nations estimates that residential densities can reach 250 units per hectare in these areas as opposed to 15 units per hectare in Karen, Loresho, and other high-income suburbs.Because they are largely squatters, people living in these areas are constantly vulnerable to being chased away from their homes by the government, which owns the land. Weru estimates that, between 1995 and 2000, 23 communities in Nairobi were faced with evictions. “Evictions are very violent,” says Weru. “People have gotten killed and injured. Social networks are broken, because people have to move away... Children stop going to school, and often move to a place where there is no school. People lose their jobs… You are out in the rain and the cold.” She says that many times, people return from work to find their homes bulldozed and their remaining possessions – three-quarters of which would have been stolen – scattered about on the streets. Inside Nairobi and beyond, the little land not being deforested or built upon is vulnerable to another encroachment – pollution. As environmental economist Naftali Ndungire was quoted in a February issue of The Nation, Kenya lacks efficient laws on waste disposal systems. This is especially true within the country's six Export Processing Zones (EPZs), says Oumo Akoth, land rights projects officer with the Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC). In those zones, which house approximately 24 foreign multinational corporations mostly in the chemical and textile industries, “local laws are almost non-existent,” says Akoth. The KHRC, which is on the verge of releasing a report about the EPZs, has found that the corporations, which dump chemicals into local rivers, “destroy this country, then they go scott free… We must evoke international standards to hold everyone accountable. International standards must respect international laws, if the EPZs are not obliged to follow local laws,” says Akoth. Also on-going is the debate about whether to allow Tiomin Resources of Canada to build its titanium mining operation in Kwale. Experts have warned that such an operation would completely destroy the fragile ecosystem and eco-tourism industry in the area. Misuse of the land – and its resulting human rights violations – is a direct contradiction of the instructions God gave to humankind to “cultivate and care for” the Garden of Eden (Genesis 2:15). In a paper he wrote for an April 1994 issue of AFER, Ernest Akhong'o, then-lecturer at Maseno University College in Kenya, argues that the drive to over-consume natural resources and to pollute the environment “means to steal from our neighbour.” Quoting such church documents as Mater et Magistra (1961, no. 107) and Gaudium et Spes (1965, no. 69), Akhong'o writes that we have to account to God for our use of the “goods of the earth,” which were given to the whole human race to enjoy and pass onto future generations for their development. The environment and development of technology must be used to serve people, to satisfy their basic needs of food, housing, health, education, and dignity of life, Akhong'o argues. He writes: “The earth is God's gift. It is our only livable home and its resources are limited. But in recent centuries human beings have used these resources in a spirit of robbery; acting as if they are endless and using technology to transform the natural resources in commodities that, in turn, become wastes.” Cathy Majtenyi, a Comboni Lay Missionary, is Managing Editor of Africanews in Nairobi.
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