South Sudanese Find Refuge at Kakuma Camp
The recent violent conflict in South Sudan has caused an influx of refugees to the Kakuma Refugee Camp in northwestern Kenya.
The LWF plays a key role in running the camp and has set up additional reception centers to accommodate the new arrivals.
The Kakuma camp was established in 1992 to serve Sudanese refugees. It now hosts people who have fled emergencies or conflict in Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Somalia, South Sudan and Uganda.
All photos: LWF/J. Macharia
The LWF provides different services to refugees at Kakuma camp to meet basic needs such as food, clothing, shelter and household goods. The camp, built to accommodate 90,000, currently hosts some 125,000 people.
The average daytime temperature is 40 degrees centigrade. Makeshift showers provided by the LWF are a welcome relief from the intense heat and dust storms. The population also faces outbreaks of malaria and cholera.
Once registered by the LWF, families receive food cards, but often must remain at reception areas before moving to the main camp because of a shortage of accommodations. Female and child-led families are most traumatized.
The majority of new arrivals are children, many of them unaccompanied or separated. The LWF is scaling up its child protection and emergency education efforts in the camp.
Many refugees have lived through traumatic experiences before reaching the camp. The LWF provides support by professional social workers to help make it easier for the refugees to settle into their new environment.
