Kibera slum, near the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, is at a considerable distance from the Indian city of Mumbai, where the World Social Forum (WSF) is scheduled to begin in just two days. Nonetheless, the 700 000 inhabitants of this slum, said to be Africa’s largest, will provide one of the summit’s talking points when it gets under way.
”We are going to celebrate those living in slum areas as heroes and heroines who have remained strong despite difficult slum conditions,” says Josiah Omotto, director of Maji na Ufanisi, a Nairobi-based organisation that helps provide basic services to disadvantaged communities. Omotto is one of 48 Kenyans who will be attending the WSF.
”They are our legends because they have not been weighed down by slum challenges. Despite all odds, they have … continued to live healthy lives up to today,” he adds.
While Omotto admires the resilience of Kibera’s inhabitants, he also sees the WSF as a platform where governments can be pressed to develop more effective ways of managing cities. For Muthoni Mbuyi, a longtime inhabitant of Kibera, improved policies couldn’t come a moment too soon.
”My house is crumbling, and soon I will have no roof over my head,” she says, pointing at the rusty iron sheets on top of her dwelling. The mud walls of the shelter have deep cracks which have been sealed with old cardboard. Nearby, a filthy pit latrine is visible.
”These walls will soon be blown [over] by the winds,” adds Mbuyi. ”The government has not shown any seriousness to improve the condition of people living in slums. It has forgotten that we are its citizens.”
Omotto agrees.
”Lack of [proper] policies has resulted in the increase of slums in the country. Such policies include first tackling poverty that is widespread,” he observes.
According to statistics from Kenya’s Ministry of Planning and National Development, more than 56% of people in the country live below the poverty line of a dollar a day.
The WSF is an annual gathering that brings together civil society organisations and activists who oppose the current economic, social and political realities.
It was started in a bid to provide an alternative to the World Economic Forum — a gathering of the political and economic elite that takes place in the Swiss town of Davos every year. The first WSF was held in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in 2001. About 75 000 people from 130 countries are expected to converge on Mumbai to attend the fourth forum, which ends on January 21.
Mike Arunga of Shelter Forum East Africa also hopes that housing issues will be given prominence in Mumbai.
”Governments have forgotten that shelter is a basic human right,” he said at the forum’s Nairobi office.
”[The] WSF must not just be another talk show, but must take seriously the shelter issue. [It must] lobby governments to consider sustainable incomes for slum dwellers,” Arunga added.
These views are echoed by a United Nations report entitled The Challenge of Slums: Global Report on Human Settlements 2003, issued to coincide with World Habitat Day on October 7 last year.
The report states: ”Slums are largely a physical manifestation of urban poverty, a fact that has not always been recognised by past policies aimed either at the physical eradication or the upgrading of slums.
”For this reason, future policies must go beyond the physical dimension of slums by addressing the problems that underline urban poverty.”
About one in six people around the world is currently thought to live in slum conditions. This amounts to nearly one billion people — a figure that may double during the next 30 years.
While WSF proponents hope the meeting may provide an important forum to discuss housing issues, sceptics claim the lack of government participation in the summit will undermine its effectiveness.
”It is the governments that make decisions,” says Rodriguez Andati, a political scientist.
”If they are not represented, nothing much can be implemented, even if the meeting comes out with a million recommendations.” — IPS