Mukuru slum dwellers to sue for land ownership.

Strolling through the dirty red lanes of Mukuru, a sprawling informal settlement in Nairobi's industrialised south east, Dorice Bosibori Moseti, 31, stops and points to a small cluster of toilets, which she says she won't use after dark for fear of rape or violence.

"We have to go in the bushes near our homes and we are still very afraid," she says. "Living in Mukuru is difficult for women."

Moseti, who has lived in Mukuru for 12 years, is part of a small group of female residents who are planning legal action on behalf of the slum's estimated 400,000 inhabitants in an attempt to take ownership of the land
upon which they reside. "We have money; we want to upgrade," Moseti says. "We are Kenyans and we have the right to have our land."

Building on squatter's rights litigation filed last September by Kenyan NGO Muungano wa Wanavijiji, the women are launching their own legal proceedings against Mukuru's landowners – private companies and individuals.

They say private ownership of the land has precluded the building of adequate sanitation facilities, forcing female slum dwellers to walk long distances to use toilets, risking sexual violence. Moseti hopes the lawsuit will lend support to Muungano's initial proceedings by illustrating the human consequences of private ownership of slum land. Both cases are expected to begin by December.

This legal action comes as Kenya's wealth gap is spiralling out of control. Nairobi was recently ranked Africa's fifth-largest hub of the super-rich, with 5,000 millionaires, while 60% of the city is estimated to live in more than 100 informal settlements.

Moseti works part-time cooking, cleaning and washing laundry to pay her 1,000-shilling monthly rent and 300-shilling electricity bill. She rarely ventures out of her home – a one-bedroom shack in a small compound she shares with 10 others – preferring to invite her friends over to watch Nollywood movies. Moseti says her son had stopped attending primary school and began scouring Mukuru for plastic waste to sell on the illegal market.

Courtesy :The Guardian.