Desperate wait for food, water as drought bites Turkana County

Mrs Lokorio Nang’ole weak after lack of food for ten days. She is among thousands of Turkana County residents hit by the drought. [Photo: Peter Ochieng/Standard]

By Michael Wesonga

Turkana, Kenya: Hunger has set in among residents of Turkana County. And as other parts of the country continue to receive rain, Turkana remains dry.

Among those affected is 70-year-old Lokorio Nang’ole who has not fed on anything for the past ten days; she looks frail and sickly. She can hardly fend for herself and depends on her two young grandchildren, one of whom is a seven-year-old grandson.

We find her chewing some herbs to distract her mind from the hunger pangs. The Turkana use this as a last resort remedy to keep their hungry going, especially the aged, as they look for food.

“I have my faith fixed on God because He knows what is best for us and the situation is beyond us,” Nang’ole mumbles.

Lopeiyo Lotoiya, Nang’ole’s neighbour and father of two, had also not eaten anything since the previous night when we visited his homestead. “We will wait for any food that might come our way by end of the day. We depended on selling charcoal to buy food but trees are also diminishing,” Lotoiya says.

Desperately trekking

More than 346,000 Turkanas urgently require water and food according to the Turkana County Rapid Food Security Assessment Report by the National Drought Management Authority (NDMA).

The researchers paint a very dark future especially in the arid and semi-arid region where residents are desperately trekking more than 20 kilometres to fetch water and in search of food in vain.

County Drought Co-ordinator Julius Taigong says the situation is worsening as malnourished patients continue to flock health centres.

“Kanukurdio, Kaeris, Naadung’a, Milima Tatu, Kaaleng, Kachoda, Natoo, Kaalem, Kokiselei, and Riokomor are among the most ravaged,” he indicates.

Turkana deputy governor Peter Ekai says the situation now requires emergency intervention. “We do not want to replicate past scenarios experienced during periods of drought where people have died of starvation,” he states adding that all stakeholders have to move fast to arrest the situation and avoid deaths.

He says all surface water has evaporated, water pans have dried up and close to 20,000 Turkana herdsmen are moving towards Loyoro in Kabong district, Northern Uganda in search of food and water.

The poorly distributed short rains in previous years did not help much leading to poor crop produce even as most water sources continue to dry up from prolonged use. “There could be a few people may be along the river beds that benefitted from a few showers sometime back, but not anymore,” he explains.

He, however, says the county government has set aside Sh100 million for repair broken water pans and Sh200 million for building new structures and water tracking services.

“In the past, we have waited until the situation got out of hand but as a county we feel this should not be the trend anymore and we are moving with speed to save lives,” Ekai said.

Turkana South sub-county commissioner Elijah Kodoh says Kalapata, Lochwa and sections of Lokichar locations are the most marginalised receiving very low rainfall.

Mr Kodoh says this is against their anticipation of improved lifestyles based on a recent assessment. “We will be carrying out another assessment very soon in vulnerable areas and provide necessary recommendations including increasing the food ratio in the school feeding programme to avoid disruption of learning,” he explains.

The sub-county commissioner says other locations like Kainuk, Kaptir, Katilu and Kalemorok are conducive for sorghum and vegetable farming but are plagued by cattle rustling and boundary conflicts leading to low food production.

Besides that, the communities are living in fear of perennial conflict between the Turkana and Toposa, Merille and Nyangatom of Ethiopia.

Ironically, residents who flocked the area surrounding the recently discovered 207 billion cubic litre aquifer in Lokitipi plains continue to languish in hunger as it remains deserted forcing the thirsty residents to spend much of their time along roads begging for water from travellers.

The aquifer was sealed after the discovery of the water reserves and is awaiting further exploration before distribution starts.

Hand, solar, windmill and diesel-powered boreholes remain the only functional and reliable water sources along the plains.

NDMA County Response Officer Nawot Damien and County Data Analyst Pius Eiton have proposed other immediate interventions that include re-activation of rapid response team to undertake immediate repairs of malfunctioning water points.

Water stressed

The team wants repair of all broken down water points across the county, repair all Government water tracks/bawsers and purchase tires to enable water tracking and water tankering/trucking at water stressed areas for community and schools.

The authority has also proposed provision of fuel subsidy to all motorised water points to make production commensurate with demand.

NDMA also suggested improvement of piped water schemes to meet increased demands by integrating solar with Gen-sets and increase storage, communal drawing points and livestock drinking troughs in Kaikor, Napak and Lokomarinyang in Turkana north, Kalokol, Kalimapus and Nakwei in central.