A local Non-Governmental Organisation has embarked on a health care and public law civil education programme targeting people who live in slums and other marginalised areas in Nakuru County. Mungano Trust Nakuru Chapter Coordinator James Mwangi, said the programme aims at empowering marginalised populations in the county with skills in combating environmentally instigated health hazards and knowledge on public law to prevent oppression and exploitation. “We have received sponsorship from our partners and we have since embarked on this programme beginning this Month of May because we realise that it is part of our mandate to educate our members and other populations in marginalised areas on quite a number of public issues directly and indirectly affecting their lives,’’ said Mwangi. According to Mwangi, the current Cholera disease outbreak in Nakuru that has so far claimed over twenty people could have been prevented if the government and other stakeholders had taken precautions in advance to educate residents in vulnerable locations against the disease. He said affected populations including food traders were also ignorant about their constitutional rights concerning government’s responsibility to stir up environmental programmes that are geared towards preventing such ailments and on traders’ rights. “All these people pay tax and deserve to benefit from government services. The food traders also have a constitutional right to receive fair treatment from the government during such calamities, but not just being rendered jobless because of mistakes that are not theirs. These are some of the issues that this programme aims at addressing,’’ said Mwangi . He noted that more than 50,000 slum dwellers have been rendered jobless since the county government banned food hawking after the Cholera outbreak in Nakuru town about two weeks ago. This however comes in the wake of continued outcry from local informal settlement residents over environmental degradation being caused by floods and poor sewerage and drainage systems with the blame being directed to the county government.

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