After speaking to the men and women of Lelmolok, we were eager to hear from the mentees – those youth who were the whole reason for our visit and for the mentoring program itself.  We were enthusiastic; the kids were what we should have expected: tired, cold in their torn jackets and indifferent to the interest of more white people coming to collect information and give, well, nothing.

We asked them about their experiences with the mentoring program, and their focus was material: they remembered the clothing that the mentors brought for them once, and the books they could sometimes afford to offer to the mentees.  The emotional support was secondary to these young people.  And why was that so surprising?  When you have lost everything that was a comfort, and there is already a cultural tendency to keep emotions in rather than letting them out, the gift of a new dress or a pair of pants without holes is paramount.

I’ve included short summaries here of my interviews with mentees.  While it was difficult to assess the significance of the mentoring in their lives, it was clear that they felt recognized by someone outside of the camp – and this may be more than enough reason for continuing the program.

Lucy Njoki

Lucy Njoki - 14 years old, 7th grade:

I like the mentoring program because they bring us clothes.  I wish I had a school uniform because other children tease me.  They make me take off my sweater when I arrive in the mornings to show I have no uniform.  When I’m with my mentor, we play games and talk about how life is going.  My mentor told me to try and forgive and forget.  [Have you? I ask.  Lucy replies, monotone and without thought, yes]  We are resettled now, but we still don’t have any food.  I have painful memories about living in the outdoors without food for days [after the violence]; my mentor encourages me to move on from these painful memories.

[What would you like to change about the mentor program?]  Maybe we could have small field trips?  Mentors could also give more guidance about life lessons – how to handle difficulties.

Note: Margaret (the chief woman at the camp) told us that most of the teachers at local schools are Kalenjin, and during the morning flag raising they tell the children from the camp to hide behind the toilets because they don’t have uniforms.

Joseph Munene

Joseph Munene - 16 years old, school grade unknown:

The mentoring program is good.  [Why? I ask] Because when some of us left the showground after the violence, we didn’t have clothes and now we do because of our mentors.

[Tell me about a time when your mentor helped you] Once there was a time I had a problem with clothing – I didn’t have enough – and my mentor helped me get clothing.  I was having bad thoughts about Kalenjin kids who were my friends and didn’t tip me off when the violence was about to happen [and they knew].  My mentor encouraged me to have forgiveness.

[What do you want to improve about the mentor program?] I want assistance with buying school books.  My parents can’t afford them.  I also want help paying for high school.

When we sat down with the men of Lelmolok Camp, we learned more about the grim political divide between the local tribes.  In the last couple of weeks, former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan announced he had a list and he wasn’t afraid to use it.  After the 2007 election, Annan assembled a list of all the individuals who incited the violence – from the top tiers of government all the way down to the local level.  He has been patiently (perhaps too patiently?) holding on to this list, occasionally telling Kenyan officials that if they do not try these perpetrators in a Kenyan court, the list will be handed over to the International Criminal Court (ICC) – and nobody wants that.  In keeping with Kenyan time, the matter was delayed.  Done with his waiting, Annan released the list to the ICC, and now it is just a matter of time before the names are made public and trials begin.  This would seem like a positive change for the residents of Lelmolok camp, but in fact it could be deadly.

The elders of Lelmolok

The elder men at Lelmolok filled us in: local Kalenjins (remember, those who were displaced are the rival tribe, Kikuyu) see any charge against their local officials as a reason to attack the Kikuyus.  It is Kikuyus’ fault, they say, that our public officials are facing these serious charges.  The Kikuyu men say they have overheard local Kalenjins conducting community meetings – minus the local Kikuyus.  In these meetings, the Kalenjins are reportedly planning to kill 10 or so Kikuyus from the camp, the argument being that burning their houses was not enough to make them leave.  Most of the Kikuyus living in the area are bracing for the worst.  Many of them have even less motivation now to start a new home; what is the point, the men tell us, if everything will only be destroyed again?

Where his house used to be

Photo: Kate Cummings. Location: Lelmolok IDP camp, Kenya. Partner: Vital Voices

The women told us their difficulties on getting by, caring for their families; the men, they told us what really happened on December 30th.  Along with the destruction of households, two people were killed that night – a 73 year-old woman and a 40 year-old man.  One of the men, sitting near the back of the group, told us he was with the man who was killed.  It was my house, he described, that was the first to be burned.  It was just after dark and he was in the house with his friend when he heard screaming.  He came outside and saw nearly 500 young men (all of them youth between 20-30 years old) surrounding his property, carrying bags of stones.  The agile youth hurled stones at the man, who ran back inside the house; moments later, the thatched roof to his kitchen was set on fire.  He and his friend moved to the living room, just as his windows were shattered by sledgehammers.  Corn husks were thrown in fistfuls through the broken windows.  The young men threw matches on the husks, setting the entire room ablaze.  The man ran out of the house and into the woods, leaving the other man inside.  Running blind in the dark, the man collided with his friend who had managed to escape as well.  When they reached an opening in the forest, another band of youth were waiting.  They threw more stones at the men, and the man telling the story was able to run through the crowd and to a grove of banana trees.  He watched from the shelter of the leaves as his friend was stoned to his knees, and then broken by sledgehammers, leaving him motionless on the ground.  The youth threw husks on the body and lit it on fire; a warning, said the storyteller.  The area was insecure for days, and the man could not get to his friend’s body.  The dogs had eaten most of it by the time he was able to safely return to the field.

How do you feel about forgiveness?  I asked, tentatively.  The men are out of energy: at first, when the election violence in 1992 took place (that’s right, it has happened with every election – 2007 happened to be the worst), we felt like we could forgive.  But because it is so frequent, we have grown tired.  We don’t even have to wait for 2012 (the next election) – as soon as the list is made public, we will be unsafe again.

Life in a tent

When we arrived at Lelmolok IDP Camp, the women and men were assembled, waiting for us.  We learned that only about five families still live at the camp; most everyone else has been resettled back to their land.  The people who came to speak to us had walked – some five minutes, some half an hour – back to the camp, and were now gathered under the sparse shade of the camp’s young trees.  We met with the women first, Charles and Francis (Kenyan university students who lead the mentoring program) translating for us.

Women of Lelmolok

Each woman told us her story of how she came to live in the camp, what her displaced life was like, and how resettlement was – or wasn’t – different.  Here are two women’s lives, in brief: Susan and Margaret.

Susan at her saloon

Susan is 28 years old, a mother of two, a member of the Kikuyu tribe, and was a farmer before the election violence.  She used to grow cabbage, collards, and raise chickens.  On the night of December 30, 2007, her farm and livestock were burned and her house destroyed.  The following weeks were similar to that described by Beatrice in the previous interview – a week at the District Officer’s residence, then over to Eldoret’s cattle showground, and finally relocated to the camp.  At first, Susan felt unsafe at the camp; local Kalenjins were restricting the Kikuyus’ movements outside of the camp’s boundaries, and threatening to harm anyone who strayed far from their tent.  A reconciliation program was established in town, and it seemed to relax tensions for a time: Susan began to leave the camp during the day, even returning to her land for a few hours each day and farming with the hope that the next day her crops would remain untouched by her neighbors.

Susan and her family have resettled back to their land, but life has not changed significantly.  Her family is still living in a tent, the same leaky one they had at the camp, and they do not have enough money to fully reinvigorate their farmland.  Now that aid donations have stopped, it is essential that Susan grow most of her own food.  She manages to grow collard greens and spinach, and has even started a local hair salon in the nearest town to earn an income.  Her husband has taken on temporary work as a driver-for-hire, and between them Susan is hoping to have enough money to add more crops to her farm next season.  That is, if the rains come (they are late) and the present crops yield a decent harvest to sustain them.

What you should know: the government gave most displaced families a one-time payment of 10,000 Kenyan shillings (about $130) to cover general costs during their displacement.  This money was usually spent on food, bedding, and latrines for the camp.  This money was not sufficient for rebuilding a home, since the average cost for a very basic home in Kenya is 50,000 shillings or, for a more permanent house (like many of them had before), around 150,000 shillings.  Prior to May of this year, Susan’s family and others in the camp were receiving monthly aid rations as follows: 6 kg of flour per person, 2 kg per household of dry porridge, and one liter per household of cooking oil.  I needn’t tell you this is not enough to live on, no matter how frugal a family, like Susan’s, tries to be.

Margaret

Margaret is 56 years old, a single mother of five, and is the informal head of women at Lelmolok Camp (and Susan’s mother-in-law).  Before the election violence, she was a farmer with a small business in town selling milk from her cows, vegetables from her farm, and assorted house products.  Since being displaced, Margaret is limited to farming, and doesn’t produce enough to sell at the market.  At the time of the violence, Margaret was living next door to her son and Susan.  She heard commotion down the street and ran out of the house to see her son’s house on fire.  Margaret and Susan, carrying Susan’s children and only what they had on, hid in a nearby field for two days, eventually reuniting with Susan’s husband.  Margaret’s property – worth an estimated one million Kenyan shillings (roughly $13,000) – was turned to ash.  Along with her belongings, Margaret had her children’s school certificates stored in the house.  Without these documents, her children (ages 13 to 37) cannot get a job or continue schooling.  When she went to the school for help, they printed a letter to serve as a substitute for the burned certificates – but there was a catch: these letters had to be signed by a local councilor for them to be valid.  The local councilor demanded a bribe of 5,000 shillings for each child (more a month’s salary for an employed Kenyan – an impossible amount for Margaret who is without work), something he knew Margaret could not pay.  Hence her son’s temporary work as a driver, despite his university education.

I asked Susan and Margaret what actions they would like to see take place against the perpetrators.  Susan: I am willing to forgive because if I seek revenge it will be an endless cycle of violence. I asked how the violence could have been avoided.  Margaret: Local leaders could be less divided – they are the ones who incited the violence so they are the ones with the power.  And what is it that you want to be different about your lives?  I asked.  Both Susan and Margaret replied: a house.  We just want a house.

Resettlement