Ghetto Reporters
Profile
Ghetto Reporters is a group of young journalists from the informal settlements/slums of Nairobi city. The group was founded in July 2007 when a team of young journalist from the slums came together with an aim of disseminating information on behalf of their communities.
The Kenyan capital, Nairobi, has some of the largest slum settlements in Africa. The slums represented in the Ghetto Reporters organization are the following;
- Kibera
- Korogocho
- Mathare
- Soweto Kahawa
- Kangemi
- Embakasi
- Mukuru
- Dandora
- Kawangware
- Mitumba
- Kwa Njenga
- Kwa Reuben
- Kayole
Residents of these slums live in squalid conditions, with lack of access to information and services like clean water and adequate sanitation. The group ‘Ghetto Reporters’ was therefore formed to keep the poor communities informed and also gathers news and information of what is happening around them.
There is a high rate of unemployment especially among the youth, some of whom resort to crime in order to survive. In addition to this, the slum dwellers have limited access to information, due to their inability to buy newspapers published by the mainstream media. Still, issues affecting the slum dwellers are rarely given prominence in the mainstream media, unless they are negative.
It is a fact that a large proportion of today’s media often tend to ignore the high population that are, either without a roof over their heads, on the streets, destitute, down-and-out, dispossessed, living rough and/or itinerant. This less privileged population is greatly exposed to the dangers of homelessness like high rates of HIV & Aids infection, high risk on their physical security & health, higher chances of drug abuse and addiction, etc. A majority of these people find themselves in such situations not by choice but by design, with poverty being a major contributor.
However, these situations are made even worse if such people are discriminated against. If these people remain unattended to, they tend to amplify negative activities that in return accelerate the homeless situation. This eventually lends wider social problems like insecurity, prostitution, drug peddling, and higher levels of ignorance, diseases, and orphans among others.
Although it is difficult to entirely wipe out this problem, it becomes quite necessary to highlight the plights of such people in our day-to-day social-Advocacy Reporting. Ghetto Reporters will work in close liaison with the mainstream media to bring to an end to this poverty of news and information to slum dwellers and those in the streets.
GHETTO REPORTERS
List of Members and the Slums Represented and short profile.
- Cosmas M. Nduva- Kibera .
- Lucy Kilonzo- Embakasi
- Nicholas Wamae- Soweto Kahawa
- Fred Adino-Dandora
- Oluoch O. Japheth- Korogocho
- Sarah A. Achieng- Mukuru Kwa Njenga
- Elizabeth Nduva- Mukuru Kwa Reuben
- Easther Thiong’o- Deep Sea
- Nancy Adhiambo-; Huruma
- Martin Njuguna- Kibera
- Kelvin Odhiambo- Kariobangi
- Bernard Adera-Kariobangi
- Stephen Waema- Kibera
- Mercy Wanjiru- Korogocho
- Danchris Ochieng- Kawangware
- Paul Njogu- Mathare
- Calystus Mutuku- Mathare