TOTAL WAR AGAINST HUNGER
Stung by the country’s pangs of hunger and raw thirst for water President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga stuck out the begging bowl to donors and humanitarian groups.

If the food appeal pulls through, the Government expects to receive Sh24 billion worth of food — including cash and medicines — to avert the humanitarian disaster looming large over Kenya. Coming face to face with troubled Kenyans with shrivelled skins, shrunken cheeks and emaciated bodies — who have woken up daily and looked to the sky hoping that rain will fall — they bought 20 bulls for immediate slaughter to feed them.

The two leaders ‘took’ the government to far-flung Loiyangalani trading centre — in Marsabit North District — and unveiled the emergency programme "to provide rapid delivery of food, water and medicine to over 10 million Kenyans in arid and semi-arid areas of the country most affected by the prolonged drought."

The emergency programme targeting 10 million Kenyans in the danger bracket was launched as reports filtered to newsrooms that famine had claimed two more lives in Homa Bay, which is not even in the traditional food crises hotspot. The two are said to have died on Saturday and Monday after going without food for more than three days in Komenya Village, East Kagan, Rangwe constituency.

They were identified as Nicodemus Odak Ouso, 87 and his neighbour Teresa Ougo Ondigo, 85.

The joint programme with World Food Programme, to be executed by a multi-ministerial team as well as military and National Youth Service and Administration Police, will try and immediately reach out to three million adults and 1.5 million children across 11 hard-hit arid districts.

It was launched a day after Kibaki and Raila unveiled Kenya’s Sh2.2 billion National Economic Stimulus Programme on Food in Hola. It is anchored on to immediate increase of irrigated landmass from the current 120,000 hectares to 400,000 hectares, and the war on destruction of water towers.

To kick off the scaled-up drought response programme, Kibaki flagged off livestock off-take by Kenya Meat Commission, and inaugurated borehole drilling and distribution of food and water to the affected families.

The President asked herdsmen whose animals are purchased to save the earnings and restock when the drought situation improved. The Head of State said KMC personnel would be stationed in the affected areas to purchase the livestock for Sh8000 per live animal.

The President and PM did not disappoint them when they charged crowds who had high hopes in the visit by promising that they will use the full force of the Government to fight hunger. "Whatever you have been told we shall do," Kibaki told the crowd.

The PM said all branches of Government had come, including the military, because they had decided to wage total war on hunger. "We are using all our resources as a state to fight hunger," Raila assured the public.

The response programme was goaded by, "serious challenges on the Government coping mechanisms posed by the unprecedented deterioration of food security in the country following failure of rains for the fourth consecutive year."

Relief food released by the Government in the last one month to over 125 districts includes 132,280 bags of maize, 62,000 of rice, 30,000 0f beans and 18,000 cartons of vegetable oil.

On Education, the Head of State urged all parents to take advantage of the free primary and subsidised secondary education offered by the Government to take all children to school. The Head of State also consented to a request by the local leadership to subdivide Marsabit North District in to two but requested local people to agree on the location of the district headquarters.

The Head of State reaffirmed the Government’s commitment to remain focused on long-term solutions that would lift the country from the cycles of drought and famine. Raila assured Kenyans affected by the current prolonged drought that nobody would starve to death.

The Prime Minister thanked development partners for continued support for relief efforts by the government and urged them to continue assisting during the emergency period.