Jonchards in Kenya: Witch doctors, puppets & human rights

I wanted to report back from recent visits I have taken with SEP to the slum areas of Kariobangi and Kibera. I’ve written about both these areas previously, but this time was a little different, a little more practical, a little more hopeful.

Having spent some months now doggedly writing funding proposals to various national and international bodies – something I hadn’t done before arriving in Kenya – my colleague and I were well chuffed when we got a “yes” from a German organisation to a proposal for a series of workshops for mothers and caregivers of children with special needs from these poverty-stricken areas. I can’t take much credit, since this proposal was written in German.

I suspect this is a standard feeling within many small NGOs who spend half their lives seeking money to fund their work, but within minutes of the initial elation and high-fiving, we were panicking. “The problem is”, my colleague laughs, “now we have to do what we said we’d do!”. Thankfully, my role in these particular workshops was limited to moral support, showing up and taking pictures.

The plan was to deliver a series of two-day workshops within the slums. Day 1 would be led by other organisations we’ve partnered with – Save The Children and Sarakasi – and would focus on “sensitising” (raising awareness – I refer you to the Kenyan-English dictionary) the parents on the human rights of their children with disabilities, and how they can demand those rights. Day 2 would be much more practical, led by seasoned SEP therapists training the parents in positioning, handling and playing with their children – ensuring those with conditions like cerebral palsy and Down’s syndrome are able to develop, progress and have better quality of life.

Shall I go back a step? Why do SEP think this kind of workshop is important?

Kariobangi slum

In Kenya’s poorest communities, thanks to traditional beliefs, a child with a disability is frequently seen as a curse on the family. They are hidden away, ignored, refused education and unable to play with others. Fathers blame mothers for giving birth to disabled children and leave them to bring up the children alone. The mothers don’t understand what is wrong with their child, and often have to leave them alone in search of work and food for the family. Meanwhile, there are not enough specialists, not enough facilities, not enough funding for special needs care in Kenya, and the little there is is unaffordable for these poor families. This situation is facing an estimated 1.8 million children in Kenya, and most are among the 2-3 million people living in slums with limited access to food, water, electricity or sewage disposal. SEP can’t solve the wider problems of poverty and lack of healthcare, but they have the expertise to build the skills of these mothers, making them better carers for their children, and working to destroy the old taboos about disability here.

I found that, much like my previous experiences in the slums, my reactions to these workshops swayed from hopeful and positive to baffled and despairing. Although to be fair, my understanding of what was going on was slightly undermined by the fact that the whole workshop was in Swahili. But it gave me a good chance to practice!

People came!

Both the Kariobangi and Kibera workshops started well. Although we had the predictable wait for people to come (“starting promptly” isn’t a concept understood in Kenya), by the time we started an hour or so late, we had rooms packed with mothers and children. The nerves that you always have about whether people will actually show up for your event, washed away as I started making friends with some of the children...

What rights do we have?

First up was a talk about human rights, the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability, and how parents of children with special needs can demand those rights.

I had mixed feelings. Many of the mothers, having walked that morning from their slum shack homes through the mud and shit with their child strapped to their back and the weight of poverty on their minds, looked at the facilitator as if to say “that might be the world you live in love, but it’s not the one we’re in”. There’s a palpable sense of defeat in the air. The UNCPWD might sound good on paper, but these mothers sense that nothing like the aspirations written on the flipcharts around the room will ever be a reality in their lifetimes.

“But remember”, says the facilitator, “the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”. “Don’t give up”, she says. “Demand your rights”. “It’s up to you”.

During a break, she sits down next to me, exhausted and demoralised. “Look, they’re not even talking to each other about it”. But as we look more closely, we realise the mothers are talking to each other, incredibly quietly, their words almost lost under the din of their wailing, laughing, gurgling children. At the end we ask them for their thoughts – What have you learned? What are your needs? How will you take action? And serious, specific, carefully thought-out responses came back:

“We need more schools that accept children with special needs, and they need to be here, not miles away”

“We need more physiotherapy”

“We need day care centres so we can leave our children safely and go to work”

“We need more workshops and visits – once isn’t enough!”

Clowning around

Our other partners for these workshops was The Sarakasi Trust. They’re an awesome organisation using clowning, acrobatics, theatre, music and general fun as a development tool. They’re a group of awesome young Kenyans, and their Hospital Project is all about bringing joy to the lives of vulnerable children – they visit hospitals all over Nairobi and bring smiles to everyone with balloons, puppets and all kinds of silliness.

See! A poster in Nairobi city centre

For our workshops they created a short play in Swahili about the parents of a child with a disability who, taking bad advice from a friend, go to a witch doctor who can “cure” their child. This might sound bizarre and unreal to you, but believe it or not it’s a frequent occurrence in many poor communities in Kenya and other African countries. When parents have no idea what causes disability, or what to do about it, it’s tempting to turn to traditional healers for solutions, and communities will often put pressure on these families to seek such answers to their “curse”. And it’s not just about children with disabilities – belief in the power of traditional healing still holds strong in many areas. As we walk around Nairobi every day we’ll pass a poster for a “Healer” offering his services in solving every problem from marital difficulties to lost possessions to poverty to even “man power”!

The mothers nodded sagely and laughed knowingly as the drama unfolded, but the real highlight was the character of the witch doctor, sauntering onto stage mumbling incoherently, demanding an ‘offering’ before talking to the higher forces only he could see, and suggesting radical solutions to the problem: “by tomorrow morning, you must bring me… the elbow of a snake! The eggs of a squirrel! The bones of a worm!”. The children loved this Disney-like character, but for the mothers, a serious point was made. The final message: you are not cursed, you are not alone, your child deserves all your love, and real help is available from professionals like ours.

Next up, a Sesame Street style puppet show featuring a little girl with a disability who loves going to school. “Sasa!”, she screams at the children (“hi!”). “Poa!” they shout back (“cool!”). There’s great silliness, sing-along songs, and both mothers and kids are soon wiping tears of laughter from their faces. The aim again to get across a serious message – your child deserves education regardless of their disability. Don’t hide them at home. They need stimulation to develop, and having a disability doesn’t mean they are incapable of learning or doing things.

What kind of day has it been?

Leaving the slums on those days, it’s hard to feel like you’re changing the world. The poverty is still all around you. You know that most of those mothers will be going home to appalling conditions and raising children with very difficult challenges on their own, with little knowledge, little support. It’s not surprising that a child with a disability is seen first and foremost as a “burden”. But as we wave goodbye, shift the goats from under our car, and drive away, we can maybe say that we’ve helped some people take some small steps on that thousand mile journey.