Forced to eat pig food: Kenya crisis

According to journalist Muchiri Karan, slum dwellers in Central Kenya's Nyeri town face “hunger and starvation…Now, the animal feed has become like a staple food in the town’s poverty ravaged slum villages of Muringa, Chania, Mathari and Githuri.”

Why?

“The slum dwellers say that unlike the relief food that runs out very quickly, the animal feed comes in larger quantities, and at a cheaper price. ‘One sack feeds six families for more than a week,’ says 35-year-old single mother, Jane Wanjiru.”

Rural drought

The crisis in these slums is not unique unfortunately. The situation in the Kenyan countryside is also worsening. The Standard reports that “drought continues to batter the country” with nothing growing in some places for over a year. The Standard video report below shows the effects of this growing crisis, particularly the plight of an elderly couple.

Waiting

They having nothing left, and wait for help or, as the report says, “divine intervention.” The video is named after them: “Two succumb to hunger.”