[kwf_members] Yala Swamp action alert - FYI

"The Kenya Alliance of Resident Associations (KARA)" info at kara dot or dot .ke  wrote:

In a large tent during the World Social Forum last month in Kenya, a People’s Tribunal heard testimonies from Kenyan communities that are suffering the injustices of corporate globalization. The Yala Swamp community was represented by three generations of men and women who traveled from Kenya’s western border to make their case against an American corporation to the Tribunal.

As a member of their audience, I was so glad that I could offer the resources of Global Response to bring their injustices to the attention of the world - and to enlist the world community’s support. This new campaign was born at the World Social Forum, and it is nurtured by the Forum’s aspiration that “Another World is Possible” - a world where people and the planet matter more than corporate profits.

Please write letters for this campaign today, and help the people of Kenya’s Yala Swamp realize their vision of another world, where they and their children can live sustainably within a vital wetland ecosystem. Thanks very much for joining in this campaign.

You can also view this action alert and a model letter at www.globalresponse.org.

--Paula Palmer, Executive Director

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Global Response Action Alert #2/07
Protect Wetlands and Communities’ Rights / Kenya
Issued March 1, 2007
Also available at www.globalresponse.org

“They call us ‘backward.’ They say we’re against progress because we oppose this company. But the company is taking our land, our source of livelihood. Our animals and our people are sick and dying from the poisons. The water is polluted, and what is happening to the birds and fishes? This is progress?”
- Erasto Michael Odindo, Yala Swamp community representative, Kenya

On the shores of Africa’s Lake Victoria, in a wetlands region called the Yala Swamp, an epic battle is raging. Here, as in many poor rural communities around the world, a multinational corporation is peddling “progress.” It’s an easy sell to bureaucrats who pocket payoffs and promotions, but the “backward” people who are supposed to be the beneficiaries aren’t buying it. In January, residents of the Yala Swamp carried their protests to the World Social Forum in Nairobi, asking the international community to support their fight for their lands, their health and their right to decide what is progress and what is not.

A “Living Museum” of Biodiversity
The Yala Swamp is a vast wetland region (over 200 square km) which cleans and filters waters that flow into Lake Victoria from two major rivers. It has been called a “Living Museum” because it provides critical habitat for endangered fish species that have disappeared from Lake Victoria itself. The critically endangered Sitatunga Antelope finds refuge among the swamps’ papyrus. BirdLife International classifies the Yala Swamp among Kenya’s 60 “Important Bird Areas,” and a 2005 World Bank report concluded that the significance of the region’s biological diversity “cannot be stressed strongly enough.”

For centuries, thousands of families have depended on the wetland for clean water, fishing, grazing and agricultural land, and the papyrus that they weave into mats, baskets and thatch roofs. “We worked hard growing maize and bananas, raising cows and bees. I inherited my farm from my father and my forefathers. I have lived here all my life,” said John Ayila who testified at the World Social Forum. “One day I saw surveyors taking measurements on my land, then came the bulldozers. They slashed all my crops and they fenced me out of the lake where we used to fish. They built a dam and now the reservoir has submerged all my land, my beasts, my houses. When I protested to my MP (Member of Parliament), he said I should take the money and move away. I will not take their money. I want my home back.”

“Dominionization”
The Yala Swamp conflict started in 2003 when regional government authorities granted a 25-year lease for rice cultivation to Dominion Farms Ltd, a subsidiary of Dominion Group of Companies based in Edmond, Oklahoma USA. Authorities approved the company’s Environmental Impact Assessment (12% of the Yala Swamp territory). But almost immediately Dominion began building irrigation dikes and a weir, airstrips and roads, and announced plans to build a hydroelectric plant and a major aquaculture venture, including fish farms, a fish processing factory and a fish mill factory, all of which would further pollute a fragile ecosystem.

For their expanded “integrated project,” Dominion wants control over 65% of Yala Swamp. Some of this area is privately owned by hundreds of families. Some of it is used communally, including the species-rich waters of Lake Kanyaboli which is critical for food security in the region. Already the company has in effect privatized the lake and public roads, blocking lake access to over 200 fishermen and impeding access to schools, markets and health clinics. Public protests have been met forcibly with arrests and teargas.

Although no Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) had been approved for these additional Dominion enterprises, they were well underway in early 2006 when scientists in the Kenya Wetlands Forum undertook a “Rapid Assessment of the Yala Swamp Wetlands.” The scientists’ report raises hundreds of unanswered questions about Dominion Farms’ potential impacts on human health and the environment. Likely impacts include altering the flow of Yala River, contamination of soils through oil leakages and spillage, pollution of the wetland ecosystem, loss of grazing land, lost of pristine fauna and flora through chemical use and aerial spraying, rising incidences of water- and vector-borne diseases, and social unrest. The report urges Kenya’s National Environment Management Authority to immediately close down all Dominion Farms activities and require new and independent EIAs to be conducted for each separate project proposed by the company.

How can we help?
Friends of the Yala Swamp, a coalition of residents and organizations, thinks international letters will help persuade Kenyan authorities to protect the Yala Swamp wetlands, as they are obliged to do under the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands. Please send letters to Kenyan authorities.

Requested Action: Please send polite letters to Kenyan government officials. Ask them to:

1) Stop all Dominion Farm activities outside the original 2,300-hectare lease unless and until new, independent EIAs are completed and approved for each Dominion project proposal

2) Provide for full participation in the EIA process of all Yala Swamp residents who could potentially be affected by Dominion Farms projects

3) Prohibit construction of industrial facilities in the swamp and prohibit construction of fish farms and other industrial uses of Lake Kanyaboli, Lake Osare and Lake Namboyo

4) Take immediate action to clarify issues of land ownership, resolve land disputes and issue title deeds to Yala Swamp residents


Addresses:
His Excellency Mwai Kibaki
President of the Republic of Kenya
Office of the President, Harambee House
P.O. Box 30510
Nairobi, KENYA
email: president at statehousekenya dot go dot ke

Dr. Muusya Mwinzi
Director General
National Environment Management Authority (NEMA)
P.O. Box 67839 Code 00200
Nairobi, KENYA
email: amwinzi at nema dot go dot ke

Please send copies of your letter to:

Mr Michael Ranneberger
U.S Ambassador to Kenya,
United Nations Avenue, Gigiri
P.O. Box 606 - 00621, Nairobi KENYA

Mr. Achim Steiner
Executive Director
United Nations Environment Programme
UN Avenue, Gigiri
P.O. Box 30552, 00100
Nairobi, KENYA
email: achim.steiner at unep dOT orG

This Global Response Action was issued at the request of and with information provided by the Friends of Yala Swamp, Action Aid Kenya (www.actionaid.org/kenya/) , the Kenya Land Alliance (www.kenyalandalliance.or.ke/) and Kenya Wetlands Forum (www.eawildlife.org/programme_areas/Yala%20report.pdf). Thanks to Sandy Krawitz, Action Aid USA, for the photos from the Yala Swamp.To request a DVD about the Yala Swamp campaign, contact info@globalresponse.org.

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Paula Palmer, Executive Director
Global Response
PO Box 7490
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Global Response organizes effective international letter-writing campaigns to protect the environment and the rights of indigenous peoples. See action alerts for adults, teens and children at www.globalresponse.org.