Thursday, January 03, 2008
Amani ya Juu
Amani ya Juu. Higher peace. In Nairobi, Kenya. Have you read the news lately about the riots in Kenya? Here is a BBC website about the current crisis in Kenya.
The photos above are from my trip this past summer to visit Amani. Amani has been closed for the time being until it will be safe for the women to come to the center of the city again. In the meantime, these women's families are in crisis. The rest of this blog post is a quote from Amani's blog with more details about the immediate needs of the Amani family during this crisis and with a request for help. Please help.
Dear friends of Amani –
Greetings from Amani in the New Year. We never dreamed we would meet the new year with violence in Kenya over the disputed elections. Kenya has always been a haven of peace for refugees for many years. Never did we imagine that Kenyans would become refugees in their own country. Hundreds have been killed, 75,000 people have been displaced, millions of dollars worth of property has been destroyed – all because of tribal differences.
We are on the brink of a civil war. The images seen on TV are frighteningly similar to Rwanda and Liberia. Kenyans are carrying machetes, wielding clubs with nails and burning people inside churches as they carry out their ethnic cleansing rampage.
Some of you have asked about the Amani women and we thank you for your concern. Many of the areas around the city where the women and their families live have erupted into violence. A number of the women are afraid to venture out of their homes for fear of being caught up in the mayhem. Ruth, who works at the Amani Café, was robbed at gunpoint when she left her home to look for food. The thugs told her to give them all her money or they would shoot her. The husband of Simprosa, who is the sales clerk in the Amani Boutique, tried to go to the local market to buy food but was accosted on the way. Thieves threatened to beat him if he did not part with his watch and money. A sister of Mary Karanja, Amani’s finance administrator, had to move from her house in the middle of the night. She had received word that gangs were going door to door killing people of her ethnic community. We have not heard from Mama Alice, an Amani cook, who lives in Kibera (a slum area on the outskirts of Nairobi where heavy loss of life and property has occurred) and are very concerned about her well being.
Fuel and food, if available, has skyrocketed in price. A head of cabbage, for example, has jumped from 25 cents to $1.25. The women can not afford to buy food at these exorbitant prices so many have gone for days already without food in the house. We need to get food to them urgently not knowing how long this crisis will drag on.
We have put a food distribution plan together and are collecting food from the productive farms north of the city, where it is affordable and available, and transporting it to the Amani center in Nairobi. Today, with $100, we were able to buy enough food to feed 10 families for two days. If you would like to help in this distribution program you can send a gift to:
Amani Foundation
P.O. Box 28133
Chattanooga, TN 37424
*Please write "food distribution" on memo line of your check.
*Or donated online at http://www.amaniafrica.org/shop/item.php?itemID=63
The whole purpose of Amani is for the women to learn how to work and live together in harmony and become promoters of peace in their communities. During this darkest hour of Kenya’s history may the women shine as lights of God’s peace.
In the power of God’s peace,
Becky Chinchen
Director, Amani ya Juu
Please click here to read a brief description of the problem and a request for help.
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