This area is full of orphans following a wave of death that swept through the community about 10 years ago. “It’s a village of orphans and old men and women struggling to live”, says a resident.
Memories of how the scourge left homesteads dotted with graves within a span of few years, still traumatise some of the living adults who witnessed the ‘attack’.
When The Standard visited the village late last month, we met Helena Oyugi, 97, sitting beside her house. She struggled to rise and offer us her seat — a sign of respect for visitors.
Helena took two minutes trying to stand before she gave up and asked for our help. You may call it old age, but you can’t overlook the effects of poverty on the old woman’s life.
The furthest Helena moves is a few metres away from the door of her house, with the support of a chair. Her knees are weak. She says her knees have developed a problem and she can no longer stand without support.
She still remembers the pain she felt when she lost her children. She now has four orphaned grandchildren to take care of, but in her condition, it is impossible to give them the kind of care children require.
Life has been difficult for the aging Helena. She started off taking care of her grandchildren when their parents allegedly lost their lives to Aids, but in the ten years since, roles have changed. The grandchildren now care for her.
Helping hand
Extreme poverty in the homestead has forced the children to shoulder the responsibility to till the land and produce food crops such as maize and millet for subsistence purposes. However, during the recent harvest, their crops experienced poor yield and the children now burn charcoal to earn a living.
The elderly woman is appealing to the government and NGOs to come to their rescue. “Life has become too harsh for me because I suffer from a chronic illness. I have lost the people who would have helped me earn a living.” she says.
Helena is not alone. Many more grannies in the village are undergoing a similar life experience.
In the same location, we meet 25-year-old Onyango* (not his real name), who says he cannot achieve his dream of becoming a lawyer due to the parental responsibilities he has had to bear since the deaths of his parents. He lost his parents when he was in Standard Six.
Through well-wishers, he attended school up to secondary level, graduating with a mean grade of B in the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education ( KCSE). At the age of 19 when he had completed his secondary education, his paternal grandmother who used to take care of him and his four siblings died.
Onyango resorted to casual labour to earn a living for himself and his family, some of whom are in secondary and primary schools.
“I should have married by now but I don’t plan to do so. I have to ensure my sisters complete their education first. I plan to join the university one day to achieve my ambition of becoming a legal practitioner but money is a challenge,” he says. Onyango tells The Standard that several of his peers are in similar situations.
Residents say HIV infection was at its worst in the area in the 1990s, a time when many had no information about it.
“It was difficult to understand and fight the disease. We only realised that it was Aids killing residents when patients were put on ARVs and their health improved,” says Titus Okeyo, a village elder.
Orphaned by AIDS
Some of the children who were orphaned during that period are now adults but others are still in school.
Neighbouring Kogelo Kalanya Primary school has many such children. The headmaster says Aids left a number of pupils orphaned, which predisposed them to moral decay, jeopardising their academic performance.
The school records show 36 of its pupils have no parents while another 54 have only one parents. Some have proceeded to secondary school but many others have dropped out.
Acting area chief Tom Murice Ondiek says more than 45 children from nine families have lost both parents as a result of the pandemic since 1997, and more than 40 others from eight families were left with single parents.
By James Omoro, The Standard
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