By Peter Apps
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Most of WFP's shipments to east and central Africa come through the Kenyan port of Mombasa, but the spiralling violence that has followed the country's disputed election has left trucks stranded and contractors refusing to move without escort.
"There are delays in reaching the rest of the region," said WFP spokesman Peter Smerdon. "Some have left Mombasa but have been held up at checkpoints or roadblocks run by vigilantes, some drivers did not come back after Christmas and some contractors refuse to leave Mombasa without escort from the security forces."
Turmoil in Kenya after President Mwai Kibaki announced victory at the polls has already killed more than 300 people, with violence bringing much of the country to a standstill.
Kenya was seen as one of the stablest countries in the region until the election sparked ethnic clashes, and is the centre for aid agency operations across a string of neighbouring countries such as Somalia and Uganda engulfed in or recovering from conflict.
Kenyan security forces had managed to escort small groups of WFP trucks trapped by ethnic violence in the western Rift Valley, scene some of the worst violence, towards their final destinations in Uganda and South Sudan, Smerdon said. But dozens of other trucks were trapped across the country.
"Most of our food distributions are monthly," he said. "If this only lasts a few days we may be able to catch up but otherwise it will cause us serious problems."
Shipments to Somalia would continue relatively normally by sea with the French navy providing escort through pirate-infested waters, Smerdon said, although the trouble in Kenya was slowing the transfer of food within Mombasa port to the cargo ship bound there.
WFP was also providing food through the Kenyan Red Cross to 400,000 people displaced by the violence within Kenya, he said, with the government also providing cereal supplies.
With its network of volunteers across the country, the Red Cross has been the first aid agency to respond to the largely unexpected crisis, with churches also sheltering those fleeing their homes. Other agencies are also stepping in.
But with instability and violence continuing, some warn they simply lack the necessary resources.
"The situation is dire," said Kizito Odock, development coordinator for the Eldoret diocese, said in a press release from Catholic aid group CAFOD posted on the Reuters Foundation humanitarian website AlertNet. "We cannot turn people away who come to us for safe haven, but our capacities are overstretched to breaking point. If we don't get help, we are heading for catastrophe." (Editing by Giles Elgood)
Source; Reuters, Jan 03, 2008