“A humanitarian disaster”: the words of Dutch Development Cooperation Minister Ben Knapen on a Kenyan refugee camp. He was there on Tuesday to witness the effects of the famine in the Horn of Africa first hand. But are politicians and the media creating too much hype?

Messages are flowing through screechy walkie talkies at Kenya’s Dadaab refugee camp. “Would you mind showing the Dutch minister’s contingent around?” one United Nations aid worker asks another. “Sorry, I’m busy with CNN and then have to help a group from the BBC,” comes the shrill-sounding reply.

It’s a busy time for the aid workers at Dadaab, as dignitaries and journalists have started flocking to the area to follow events in what the UN has described as “the largest refugee camp in the world and the worst drought in half a century in the Horn of Africa.” The World Food Programme and the UN have officially declared a famine in the affected region of Somalia and credited it with emergency status.

Malnourished children
For months now, Kenyan media have been highlighting the food crisis, malnourished children and desperate nomadic tribes. Dadaab camp, set on semi-arid plains, was built in 1991 at the outbreak of civil war in Somalia. When the fighting intensified, hundreds of thousands of people fled to the camp, returning home when the conflict died down. It was meant to house 90,000 people, but it’s expected to hold some 400,000 refugees soon.

Dadaab is like a gigantic village. At the market, camels are sold at high prices; in shops on the dusty main street, credit is offered for mobile phones; and the mild drug miraa - a plant whose fresh leaves and soft twigs are chewed to release a juice containing cathine, which affects the user’s mood - is widely available. Many refugees live in a kind of tropical igloo, round huts for nomads, just like they do in the bush.

A worthy cause
Humanitarian workers have managed to galvanise the press into highlighting the full scale of the catastrophe. Ministers feel they have to join in to help the cause. “There’s a humanitarian disaster going on right here,” said Minister Knapen while in Dadaab.

“One in eight children is undernourished, a real emergency situation. That message has to get through to Dutch people. And the UN and other aid organisations need more capacity, because lots more Somali refugees will continue to arrive in Dadaab.”

'Famine pornography'
There’s a certain cynicism in some circles regarding the lack of respect shown by the media and politicians towards victims of disasters. The term “famine pornography” has been dropped as the media binge on pictures of the dying.

But the aid industry's panicked calls for help are also understandable, especially when so many of the victims live in remote areas, further isolated by war. The militant group al-Shabaab, which controls many southern and central areas of Somalia, only lifted its ban on humanitarian agencies last week.

Songabo Mohamed is one of the more than one thousand Somali refugees arriving in Kenya each day. “Somalia is your motherland and that’s where you’ll die,” she was told by members of al-Shabaab when she tried to flee south Somalia.

Fatten the terrorists
Will the Netherlands donate money to areas under the control of al-Shabaab? “That’s out of the question,” exclaims Minister Knapen, “we cannot subsidise terrorists.” But the UN made its first aid delivery to Baidoa last weekend, an area controlled by al-Shabaab.

“Foreign aid groups will have to monitor the deliveries – we have to reach the poorest and the worst affected, not fatten the terrorists.”

"Just dreadful"
In Dadaab, a weakened woman carrying a pile of mats and jerry cans on her head collapses. Women with emaciated and exhausted babies stand in long queues at a food distribution point. For Minister Knapen, the statistics are real people.

“Did you see that haggard old woman there? What’s happening here is just dreadful.”

Minister Knapen says he is determined to continue passing on his message, even after his visit to this tragic refugee camp.

(jn/ae)