Once you get beyond the scrabble of ramshackle stalls, workshops and stands of flame trees, acacia and bluegums that hug the road north out of Nairobi in the direction of Thika, the land of central Kenya rolls away, undulating gently. The grass is pockmarked by thorn trees and the occasional plot of withered, harvested maize.
People are not prosperous in this part of Kenya. Hunger, poverty and a shortage of drinking water are everyday matters, and now, through the villages, hamlets, and scatterings of huts, slouches another plague, HIV/Aids. An estimated 2,1-million people out of a population of 29-million already have the disease. The proportion of the population already infected reaches as high as 36% in certain areas. One in 10 Kenyan families is already headed by a child.
In and around Thika it is estimated that 34% of the population are either HIV-positive or have Aids. Under the pressure of death and poverty, the
pattern of the extended family is beginning to break down. In the past,
orphaned children were cared for by uncles or aunts or grandparents. But such are the numbers involved now that in many cases these extended families simply do not have the resources to feed the extra mouths.
The bare statistics and their consequences are distressing. It would be easy to succumb to feelings of despair and utter helplessness, but the children of Kenya seem reluctant to do so.
A gathering of 150 eight-to-15-year-olds at Ndula primary school have been watching a video that vividly and accurately portrays the process by which HIV/Aids is transmitted, and its progress from viral infection to death. The video was written and filmed by another group of children.
After they have watched the film, Ibrahim Mohammed, chairman of the Peer Educators Club, a tall boy with knobbly knees, conducts a discussion with the audience, exploring the various points made in the film, making sure that all have understood the messages.
”How did the girl in the film get infected?” he asks.
”Because of circumcision or from the boy she had sex with,” pipes up a small girl.
One small boy asks: ”Can you get Aids immediately from sex?”
A girl, no more than 12, stands up and says, ”You can get the HIV virus, but not Aids. HIV is the virus. Aids is the disease that develops from it.”
The discussion turns to the taboo surrounding Aids. One or two children explain how they have tried to discuss the matter with their parents, but have been told to shut up. A boy stands up: ”Some parents find it difficult to learn from their children. But they will have to.”
The observation is greeted with applause.
Ibrahim draws the discussion to a conclusion, and the children troop outside into the brilliant sunshine, to join the rest of the 382-strong school. Fifteen of them are orphans.
And there, using a mixture of parable, improvised drama, poetry and song, Nicodemus Chege, David Kamau, Osman Abdi, Ann Mwikali and Agnes Nduku explore HIV/Aids and related themes. The performance is full of sly observation of adult behaviour, wit and humour that cause children and staff to laugh with recognition.
The mood is serious, but cheery, even upbeat. While all of these children will have had bitter experience of HIV/Aids, there is no sense that they have submitted to its tyranny, or that they are helpless in the face of it.
The Ndulu Primary Peer Educators Club is run by children for children. The original 15 children involved have now become 30. The club is encouraged by the headmaster, and supervised by three teachers. They have been trained in HIV/Aids awareness by Patrick Odongo, the programme officer responsible at the Thika
district office of Plan International.
Plan International has a low profile for such a large and proficient organisation. The charity was founded in 1937. In 2002 it worked with a budget of £20-million, funding projects in 45 countries, from Albania to Vietnam.
The charity’s mission is to strive to achieve lasting improvements in the quality of life of deprived children in developing countries through a process that unites people across cultures and adds value to their lives.
However, out there among the flame trees of Thika, the business of enabling children and their families to meet their basic needs and, indeed, of promoting children’s rights and interests, has a brisk reality.
Wairimu Mungai is a warm woman with a wide smile. In 1997 she and three friends decided that the communities they knew needed to make their own stand against the tide of HIV/Aids. They founded an organisation funded in part by Plan, and they work closely with the local Plan programme officer.
She speaks of poverty and the pressures it puts upon families, and particularly upon their children. ”The girls,” she says, ”have to go out to collect firewood or sell eggs in the bars, and they often get raped while they are doing those things.”
Her voice is sad, but matter-of-fact. She does not dwell upon the appalling nature of these acts, but upon what the communities can do about it. Knowledge is her chosen weapon. ”Our work sets out to empower communities to take responsibility for responding to HIV/Aids,” she says.
Through individual communities, Mungai’s organisation brings hope and help to more than 200 adults living with Aids and to more than 330 children orphaned by the disease.
These children, who will number about one million by 2005, live in a society that is still struggling to come to terms with the disease. Open discussion is hampered by a deep taboo surrounding sex. HIV/Aids itself has such a stigma attached to it that
infection leads to rejection.
But if adults are shackled by tradition, the children are not. They want to change the nature of their society from the bottom up. It is not so much grass-rooted rebellion as a youth-rooted one.
Plan started its own school-based HIV/Aids initiative in 2000. The Kenyan government followed suit in 2001. The children will be armed with the necessary information and materials to educate their elders.
Plan’s approach is dictated by the needs of the children. The primary focus is on sponsorship of individual children. Currently there are 72 281 of them scattered over 13 districts. Each child is linked to an individual sponsor and is the conduit for aid for community development programmes. These are designed to be focused on the needs of the children, but the needs of the child and those of the community tend to be synonymous .
Little by little, a network of volunteers set about reordering the process of their lives. They are willing to accept responsibility for bringing HIV/Aids under control. They just ask for the tools to be able to do so. — Â