KENYAN MINISTER VISITS CHARITY OFFICES IN OXFORD
Date: 02/06/2009
The Hon. Mohamed Elmi, Minister of State for the Development of Northern Kenya and Other Arid Lands, and his Permanent Secretary Ms Mary Ngari will visit the offices of Oxford-based African charity SOS Sahel UK to discuss gaps in education for nomadic children in Kenya. SOS Sahel, set up in response to the African droughts in the 1980s, has launched an ambitious new programme in collaboration with the Government of Kenya to tackle one of the great unfinished tasks of development: education for all. In doing so, it is helping the Government to step closer towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals of eliminating gender disparity and providing universal primary education.
“SOS Sahel UK is now in a position where it is helping shape the long-term development direction of Kenya’s pastoral areas.”
The Hon. Mohamed Elmi, Minister for Northern Kenya & other Arid Lands, September 2008
The agenda of the visit will focus on the fruitful relationship between the charity and the Kenyan Government, the Government’s aims to increase education to nomads, and fresh findings from SOS Sahel UK’s recent research with nomadic communities. This new Ministry for Northern Kenya and other Arid Lands was created by the Kenyan coalition government following the post-election violence in 2008 and is a landmark in the Government’s efforts to reduce the under-development of Kenya’s arid north. The disparities between Northern Kenya and the rest of Kenya are starkly highlighted by the fact that Northern Kenya covers 70% of the country but has no High Court, no land registry, no university campus, and only one district town connected to the national electricity grid.
Besides being a basic human right, education can play an important role in helping nomads respond to external forces such as globalisation and climate change. It is also crucial in supporting national economic development and social cohesion. However, access to learning is difficult for nomads because communities are small, dispersed and mobile, and children are needed to herd livestock so have limited time for school.
“We are tired of having to choose between knowledge and wealth, being educated but poor, or wealthy but ignorant...‚‚
A Boran elder speaking at a pan-African gathering of nomadic herders, January 2009
The statistics in Kenya are shocking: nationally 80%of primary school age children are in school, but in most pastoral districts enrolment rarely rises beyond half of that figure. In pastoral North Eastern Province (NEP), enrolment is much worse: only 20% of children go to school. Sadly, girls fare much worse than boys: nationally 0.97 girls go to school for every boy - nearly the same number of boys and girls. However, in NEP only 0.58 girls are in attendance for each boy - only half as many girls as boys. This appalling lack of services to nomadic people is not limited to Kenya alone. There are about 200 million nomadic herders in the world, mainly in Africa and central Asia and most lag far behind in terms of education.
SOS Sahel UK is assisting the Kenyan Government by investigating creative and practical solutions to providing an education to dispersed and mobile populations. For example, it is looking into the use of new technologies, such as learning by radio and mobile phone so that children can study at a distance. Mobile schooling stands to benefit girls in particular, since they are able to remain under the supervision of their parents. By learning from the successful experiences of other countries such as Iran, Mongolia, Australia and even Switzerland, SOS Sahel UK hopes that its Kenyan programme will lead to the scaling up of a nomadic education initiative across the Sahel region of Africa.