KENYA: Activists campaign to challenge rich nations on poverty

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

NAIROBI, 27 Apr 2005 (IRIN) - Kenyan anti-poverty activists have joined their counterparts in southern Africa in a campaign designed to make the voices of the continent's poor heard by leaders of rich nations when they meet in Scotland in July, for the G8 summit.

Fair trade, debt cancellation, increased and better quality aid were the key issues that the social justice campaigners would be asking the leaders of the group of seven Western industrialised countries and Russia to address when they meet in Gleneagles, for the 6-8 July summit, the activists told reporters in Nairobi on Tuesday.

The campaign, coordinated by ActionAid International, also laid emphasis on transparency and accountability at the level of national governments in poor countries.

The activists were using a bus as a symbol to mobilise developing countries to challenge the G8 leaders and ask them to support and not undermine efforts by Africa's poor to overcome poverty, injustice and social exclusion.

The effort was been dubbed the "Get On Board campaign", Asenath Omwega, ActionAid's regional director for Africa, told reporters.

"The bus is a symbol of the most excluded people in Africa and it is carrying what the poor are saying to the G8 countries," she added.

The bus will carry the voices of those affected by HIV/AIDS and other health problems, those without access to education and those who do not have enough to eat, she said.

It left South Africa on 1 April on an epic voyage to Scotland, traversing Mozambique, Malawi and Tanzania. It is expected to arrive in Kenya on Sunday before going on to Uganda.

The vehicle will on 15 May be driven to the Kenyan port of Mombasa from where it will be shipped to France for the onward journey to Britain via Italy and its final destination in Gleneagles where it is expected to arrive on the 6 July, the openning day of the G8 summit.

"During its journey in parts of Africa the [bus] team has met with unbelievable stories - of tragedy, as well as passion and real hope," ActionAid said in a statement. "The bus carries some of their powerful messages to the world's as well as their own political leaders," it added.

James Kamau, an official of the Kenyan NGO, Kenya Treatment Access Movement, lamented that an increasing number of Kenyans living with HIV/AIDS were unable to afford anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment because of poverty.

Kamau, who described himself as a person "positively living with HIV/AIDS", said of the 250,000 people living with AIDS in Kenya who were "in urgent need" of ARVs, only 30,000 were currently receiving them.

[ENDS]