Starving Somalis welcome new mouths to feed as God's gift

By Anindita Ramaswamy Aug 5, 2011, 20:48 GMT

Dadaab, Kenya - Halimah was born before dawn on Thursday in a tent made of plastic sheets, twigs and cardboard, on an anonymous patch of sand in a Kenyan refugee camp, to a starving Somali family of seven who welcomed her as a 'gift from God.'

Her 22-year-old mother, Habiba Mohammed, was alone at the time and was assisted only by a neighbour, who had a handful of cotton and bandages given to the family at a faraway health clinic when they first arrived from Somalia 10 days ago.

'I'm very happy to have a girl. We're very poor and have little to celebrate with. My wife and new child are hungry and I can't even buy them some milk. But she is a gift from God,' says her father, Hasan Abdi Mohammed, 40.

The long journey on foot from Somalia to Kenya has been one of life and death, loss and recovery, for many Somali families. Mothers have given birth on the way, many have arrived here in various stages of pregnancy, some have lost their children to the famine, and a few have left seriously ill infants by the wayside after losing hope of their survival.

'When a baby is born in Somalia, we slaughter an animal and have a big feast,' says Mohammed. 'But today we have nothing. I am happy that news of her birth has spread and people have come to see her.'

Mohammed says he was out looking for firewood when his wife went into labour. He had walked several hours away into the bush from their temporary home on the outskirts of the Dadaab refugee camp. They are waiting to get registered with the Kenyan government, get a tent from the United Nations and move into one of the camps.

Until then they exist in Dadaab's 'no man's land' with hundreds of other families, spread out in makeshift homes as far as the eye can see over several acres of remote land, with neither a food centre nor health clinic in sight, and the fear of hyenas and other animals.

With the little that they have, the woman have tried to create separate areas to cook, fenced off with thorny branches, dried leaves, ripped cartons bearing UN logos and the covers of bags of wheat. Many of them have similarly made boundaries around their 'homes' for some measure of privacy.

Mohammed says the family of pastoralists moved from Sako in Somalia's Middle Juba region after their livestock died. 'We are used to living in the bush. But not like this.'

Women and girls crowd around the tent chattering and giggling, waiting to get a glimpse of baby Halimah. They have nothing to offer her now, but their good wishes and blessings. Mohammed says she was named after his wife's mother because 'it is a Somali tradition to name babies after our ancestors.'

But Halimah was also picked, he says, because it was the name of the Muslim Prophet Mohammed's wet nurse. 'She was generous and kind and breastfed him,' says the proud father. 'Away from our homeland, maybe some other mother will help her when we can't.'

Omar Jelle Malin, a father of a four-month-old boy, has lived at the Ifo camp since 1991. He considers himself fortunate to be wealthy enough to afford a celebration after the birth.

'When a boy is born, we kill two goats. For a girl, it is one goat,' he says. 'We read the Koran over him, called religious leaders to bless him, and gave him something sweet to eat - dates.'

Mohammed says, 'God willing, we will have more healthy children. Millions of our people have died in the fighting and famine. Life continues, even here. Our children are all we have left.'