Kenya - Kibera Slums
KIBERA, KENYA has one of the largest slums in the world. Every day kids are
losing their parents to aids and being left to survive in these slums. The Kibera Kids
Center Orphanage was founded to care for these kids. Here they receive 24/7/365 loving
care in the form of food, warm bed, clean clothes, fresh water, schooling, and medical
care - everything a child needs.
Due to the recent financial shortfalls, of the 180 orphans at the orphanage, 80 were forced to return to living in the slums. Can you imagine having to choose who would go and who would stay? If they only had the operational funds, they could house and care for almost 400 children.Fifty-Four percent of people living in Kenya slums such as Kibera are either HIV positive or have AIDS.
Kibera Kids Center * Nairobi, Kenya "Oasis of Hope"
YWEA 2009 - Kenya will focus on the Kibera Kids Center Orphanage. In 2001 God planted the seed of Kibera Orphanage in the hearts of Jim & Deborah Womble and that seed has grown into a wonderful “Oasis of Hope”. Planted on a high hill overlooking the world’s largest slum - which encompasses 630 acres , the Kibera Kids Center is the home to young boys and girls who’s mothers and fathers have died from AIDS leaving them homeless and hopeless. Here they receive 24/7/365 care that includes food, a warm dry bed, clean clothes, clean fresh water, loving care givers, schooling and medical care - everything a child needs.
However, there are two pressing issues that face this orphanage. Financial shortfall has left its mark on this wonderful and beautiful place. Recently, Deborah cried as she recounted the horrible day she was forced to tell 80 of the children that they had to return to the slums of Kibera because there was insufficient operational funds to feed, and care for them. Many of these children returned to abuses such as forced prostitution, hunger, and even death.
There are currently over 100 children still at the orphanage. While we praise God for their care, just over the fence enclosure it is estimated that more than 500,000 children live in utter hopelessness. Poverty, Hunger, and Abuse are the only emotions that many of these children ever experience.
Another sad note is that Kibera Kids Center has the ability to house and care for almost 400 children, if they simply had the operational funds.
Statistical Information about Kenya
- The average home size in Kibera is 3 meters by 3 meters, with an average of five persons per dwelling.
- Most houses here are wooden shacks with a mud floor and a tin roof - no toilets or running water.
- The schools in this Nairobi slum will usually have mud/dirt floors, grey mud walls and old school wooden pews. The classes may be the size of your lounge and have as many as 60 kids and no books, no pens, pencils or other writing materials.
- The inhabitants of Kibera live on less than a dollar a day. Often they do not have enough money to pay the school fees or buy food and medicine.
- Kibera, with a population over 1,000,000 people, is one of the largest slums in Africa, if not the world. This large population of ethnically diverse makeup is constrained to an area the size of Manhattan’s Central Park. Half of the population are estimated to be under the age of 12.
- Kibera is a slum with over 1 million people. The population density is 30 times that of New York City. Most people living in Kibera have little or no access to basic necessities, such as electricity, clean water, toilet facility and sewage disposal. The combination of poor nutrition and lack of sanitation accounts for many illnesses and deaths. Because of the lack of toilet facilities (1 for every 500-1000 people), two in three residents must use a “flying toilet.” A “flying toilet” is when a resident uses the bathroom in a plastic bag and tosses it onto the roof of surrounding shacks.
- There are also over 50,000 AIDS orphans surviving in Kibera, often cared for by grandparents, over crowded orphanages, or completely unattended. For these and all children in Kibera, schooling is rare and dependant on the ebb and flow of family finances, trapping them in a cycle of poverty.
"Pure & lasting religion before God our Father means
that we must care for orphans…" - James 1:27
