Stateless Pemba community asks for recognition as citizens

Saada Hamisi, a resident of Kichaka Mkwaju in Kwale County, is worried about the day she will deliver a child.

As a Pemba community member, a stateless ethnic group living in parts of Kwale, Mombasa and Kilifi counties, she has never had access to Linda Mama, a free health insurance scheme for pregnant women.

“I am not the only one affected. All the Pemba women find challenges during delivery because they cannot give birth at home, and at the same time will be required to foot all the hospital bills after the procedure,” she said.

She explains that their husbands are mainly fishermen and their earnings are barely enough to feed them and also settle huge hospital bills.

She is among 7,000 members of Pemba community who have lived in Kenya for decades with no document to prove that they are Kenyan citizens. This has in turn denied them critical government and social services.

They have renewed their calls to the government to recognise them as Kenyans.

On Monday, some of them gathered in Lungalunga with officials from the Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC) with hopes of getting a positive response from legislators representing them in Parliament.

They had presented their petition last March to the National Assembly’s Administration and National Security Committee in Kilifi and Shimoni.

Statelessness

But their statelessness is yet to be addressed.

Free health insurance is not the only benefit that Ms Hamisi misses. As a person operating a small business, she would wish to join women's chamas, but this too is difficult for her because she lacks an ID.

“As much as I would want to join the other women, I cannot because I do not have an ID. Sometimes when the situation is dire, I am forced to hire someone’s card just to join the group,” she explained.

Shaane Hamisi Makame, a fisherman, who is also the chairman of the Pemba community in Kenya, said they have been arrested repeatedly by police officers and the Kenya Coast Guard while fishing because they don’t have identity cards.

Fishing and subsistence farming are the community’s main economic activities.

“We have nothing to prove our nationality or citizenship, so most of the time when we go fishing, we are arrested because officials think we are Tanzanians fishing in Kenyan waters illegally,” he explained.

Huduma card

Some of his fellow Pemba, he said, had resolved to acquire identity cards illegally by getting “Good Samaritans” to give them the cards when registering for birth certificates.

Organizing secretary Ali Mkasha said that other than lacking services, they will also not vote in this year’s election.

Kilifi MP Owen Baya, who presented their petition in Parliament, said lawmakers had passed it and he was awaiting the Executive to launch the issuing of IDs to the stateless community.

“We have already played our part. The ball is now in President Uhuru Kenyatta and the Ministry of Interior’s court to make the final decision, which has been delayed,” he told the community.

He added that with the Huduma Bill that will soon be presented in Parliament, things will be much harder for the Pemba, and any other stateless community.

This is because people without a Huduma card will not get government services.

“If the bill is passed, it will make it even harder for the Pemba community to be given citizenship. It will also mean that they cannot go to the hospital or even report a crime because if you are not a citizen, you cannot be served,” he said.

Lungalunga MP Khatib Mwashetani said that it saddens him that he is unable to provide services such as bursaries to most of the residents because they lack identity documents.

“We are going to write a letter to Dr Matiang’i and ask why, after the Parliament approved the petition, they have not yet acted on the recommendations that said that the Pemba are Kenyans that should be granted citizenship,” he said.

The two lawmakers were accompanied by Kibera MP Imran Okoth, who said that Nubians living in Kibera are stateless and equally facing the same challenges as the Pemba.

Meanwhile, Pemba representatives and human rights groups such as Haki Centre and Kwale Human Rights Network have promised to walk in reverse from Mombasa to Nairobi’s State House to present their grievances to the President.

"If the government does not respond to our plight, we will march to State House, just like the Makonde, and face the President," said Kwale Human Rights officer Mohammed Baro.

Another stateless community seeking recognition are the Warundi, who live in Makongeni, Kwale County.

They want the government to grant them citizenship as it did to the Makonde in 2016. The Makonde were issued with identity cards.