The Ministry of Interior, on Tuesday, May 9, adopted a new Marshal Plan to address the looming crisis involving refugees in the country.
During the launch of the new strategy, it was established that Kenya hosts close to 800,000 refugees and asylum seekers, with over 577,000 registered and over 200,000 profiled in Dadaab and Kakuma.
According to the Intergovernmental Steering Committee on Kenya’s Marshal Plan for Refugees, their presence had forced the country to depend on foreign aid to sustain them.
To avert the crisis, the government adopted Marshal Plan to find proper ways to support them. Among the proposal presented by the team included developing frameworks that would tap into their social-economical potential to empower and promote their self-reliance.
"It aims at enhancing access to effective registration, documentation, basic services such as education, healthcare, water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), energy, jobs and livelihoods," Immigration Principal Secretary Julius Bitok stated.
Besides tapping into refugees' and asylum seekers' potential, President William Ruto's administration indicated that it had plans to convert the refugee camps into integrated settlement centres where they would receive social support.
Additionally, the Immigration Department explored plans to repatriate them in accordance with Global Compact on Refugees.
The local communities would benefit be the key beneficiaries of the Marshal Plan adopted by the government, PS Bitok maintained.
“At the heart of the Marshal Plan is the host community. We will work to ensure the host community members are the direct beneficiaries of all development programmes in refugee-hosting areas. It is important that there is equity in terms of assistance provided to promote peaceful co-existence," Bitok remarked.
Defending the new strategy, the Immigration Department argued that a surge in cases of refugees had led to increased cases of crime in the country.
Further, the government lamented that uncontrolled refugee camps had allowed several extremist groups to infiltrate the country.
Raymond Omollo, PS Interior, also attributed increased cases of human trafficking and smuggling to the refugee surge in the country.
According to the PS, the security organs had received intelligence for reports of how refugees had exacerbated the security situation in affected areas.
"There are subsequent regulations being formulated that will go with the Act in terms of how to manage refugees, but the integrated approach under the Marshal Plan will help us deal with acts of terrorism and radicalisation because we will be able to empower even the host communities so that they can identify potential troublemakers," PS Omollo reiterated.
He, however, announced that law enforcement officers had heightened operations along border points to curb illegal crossing.
