Summary

Muungano wa Wanavijiji being a movement has received support over the last 20years from Sdi international among others through two support organizations Sdi.Kenya and Akiba Mashinani Trust. This has been for all informal settlements in 5 major Counties where we work namely: Nairobi, Nakuru, Mombasa, Kitui and Kiambu. Nairobi being the capital city has major slum issues where this best practice is based in an area known as Mukuru comprised of 3 settlements.

Background and Objective

The major problems are severe densities, inadequate basic services (in poor condition) and relatively poor housing. There are at least 250 persons per acre; of the 100,000 families living in the SPA. The women and children are most affected especially by the challenges of water and sanitation.

Actions and Implementation

One of the major challenge in this project is the size of the area; over 500 acres occupied by 33 villages and over 100,000 families; and the focus ‘’leave no one behind’’. The team devised a model of mobilization; first dividing the area into 13 segments which have a population of approximately 8000 households. From the segments are another category of sub-clusters each comprised of 100 households, thus a segment has 80 sub-clusters. The other lower category of participation is a cell comprised of 10 households. The meetings at the cell level are for everyone, at the sub cluster level which is comprised of 100 households 2 representatives for each cell meet at the sub-cluster level. At the segment level however the meetings conducted are in seven categories based on the thematic areas where very category has two representatives from the sub-cluster (see illustration). The illustration shows seven committees where the consultative meetings will be conducted. This will each be comprised of 160 persons per meeting excluding the institutions and partners involved. The institutions include CBOs, SHGs, NGOs, County government, Academic institutions, Groups as disabled, traders, religious among others. These committees will hold 3 meetings in every segment engaging community members on every thematic areas. Meetings are being held monthly within the committee and once in three months for all the committees. Periodic reports are shared by the lead committee leaders which are checked against the targets.

Outcomes and Impacts

The partners led by Akiba Mashinani Trust seek to ensure that there is minimal financial usage through better community organizing and ownership. This project seeks to end up in implementation of project as housing and infrastructure which will deal incorporate green concepts. Housing will be provided through the savings schemes where any additional financial support will be provided as a loan, the residents will contribute a percentage of this cost. This will again be recovered through the savings groups, that’s why the community organizing is taking quite some time since it forms the basis for this whole project. The organisation has trained its personnel on loan performer which is a system that is able to manage large volumes of data efficiently. This will help track loans which can be viewed by all the partners as long as the software is installed in their computers, but will be updated by Akiba Mashinani Trust who have direct contact with the community. The partners will also seek for especially housing models that are affordable and implementable by the community. The community has been involved from the commencement of the study and this has continued over time having them spearhead all activities on the ground and in building partnerships. They have been organized through cells formation which is comprised of ten households; this is the least level of community involvement to the segments which is the highest. The segments will be comprised of approximately 800 cells which form the 80 sub clusters (1 sub clusters=100 households). In the segments meetings will be held and the voices of all members of the community will be heard. This is because what is discussed at the segments will trickle down to the sub-clusters, then to the cells and finally to the household and vice versa.

Gender and Social Inclusivity

This initiative is meant to set precedent for slum upgrading in Kenya, it is however borrowing from previous smaller projects that the organization has done as: Huruma housing project, Railway Relocation Action Plan and the stages they were involved in for Kibera KENSUP project. This borrowing has also been from international affiliates in India; Mumbai where the largest and most successful slum dwellers federation is found. The other Counties that are borrowing from this initiative are Kiambu County and Kitui where the organizations’ work is based. This was initiated by the County officials we have invited in some of the meetings regarding SPA. The community also indicated that they were interested in improving their livelihoods. Kiambu County have made steps as well and are in the process of preparing an advisory plan for one settlement known as Kiandutu. Kitui County on the other hand; there are ongoing activities of organizing the community towards engaging the County government. So there has been intercounty strategy transfer among these Counties. There are plans to have an exchange to Mumbai, India which will involve all the partners represented. The local exchange and transfers of knowledge involves relatively less resources than the international ones.

Innovative Initiative

Community involvement is very key as they are rich in ideas; when we involved them in engaging the County government on what would be their priorities it was very productive as they understand their area better. Building partnerships makes work easier; while Akiba Mashinani Trust is very good in working with the community the County government and other agencies are good in implementation or specific areas of focus. The role of planning rests on the County government but over time they have not been able to reach the informal settlements due to the land ownership controversy but also lack of reception from the community members. We incorporating them made their work easier as we would with the community organizing bit. The academia is also very key and rich in ideas of how to better the settlements and shouldn’t be left out in making such key community decisions. Community organizing takes time and requires more time that every other step, as long as the community is organized then every other initiative fits in place easily. Legal and policy frameworks are very key in making such initiatives binding which makes most organization comfortable and willing to be engaged in the process. This makes even financial mobilization easy and successful since to some their involvement is financial.

Resources devoted to delivery

No. Title Source Author Publication Title Volume Number Date Page Number 1 Declaration of Mukuru as SPA Kenya Gazette CXIX- No. 114 11th August, 2017 4753-4754 Edit 2 Declaration of Mukuru as SPA Kenya Daily newspaper County government of Nairobi 17th March, 2017 26

Conclusion

One of the major objective of this initiative is to form precedent for slum upgrading in Kenya, this will thus inform and influence policy whether amending or creation of new policies. The other key thing to point out is that this project is implementing policy and legislative framework currently. The Kenyan 2010 constitution emphasizes on participation which we are capitalizing on. Physical planning Act and County government act allows for segregation of areas as SPA but also that the County government spearheads the planning process respectively. The County has a neighbourhood act which this initiatives seeks to follow; every segment will form a neighbourhood association.