NAPENDA KUISHI REHABILITATION PROGRAM

Napenda Kuishi Rehabilitation Program is a registered Not for Profit Organization. Napenda Kuishi was founded in 2006 as a concrete answer to the questions and challenges posed by the presence of street teens and youth in the Kariobangi and Korogocho slums. Since its inception in 2006, the program has rehabilitated and facilitated the education and medical care several hundred street teens and youth from Korogocho, Dandora, Mathare, Huruma Kayole, Kariobangi and Ngong.

Napenda Kuishi offers equal opportunity rehabilitation to all in need without any discrimination. Napenda Kuishi does not charge any fee to rehabilitate youth or young adults with addictions; rather it mobilizes resources both human and financial to support health care, rehabilitation, education and nutrition needs of its beneficiaries. Napenda Kuishi operates five different facilities: three rehabilitation Center: Boma Rescue Center and Kisumu Ndogo Center that are not-residential, out-going patients centers and Kibiko Residential Home, a full fledged rehabilitation residential facility. In addition to this, there is the Napenda Apartment, a half way home for teens ready to be reintegrated into society and who are in school. The last facility is our Vocational Training Center called Daniel Comboni Vocational Training Center, also located in Kibiko, Ngong. The Training School is for teens who have completed their rehabilitation are trained and certified in Carpentry, Electrical wiring, Plumbing, welding and Masonry.




Featured

Trip to Lake Naivasha

Our boys and staff enjoyed a trip to lake Naivasha. This is a program activity done to break class monotony as well as expose our boys, so that they can view life in a differentContinue reading

Home Tracing in Meru

On Wednesday, 26th July, 2023, we successfully did home tracing for two boys (Jeff and Brandon) who are going through their recovery journey at Rongai residential rehab. It was a happy moment re-uniting the boysContinue reading

African Child Celebrations

Rongai residential rehab celebrated the day of an African child together with other charitable children institutions in Kajiado North. We participated in activities related to this year’s theme i.e ‘the rights of a child inContinue reading

Hike at Ngong hills

The young men from Kisumu Ndogo Korogocho Center, went on a hike at Ngong hills.Their objective was to:1.Hike the hills2.Find some tranquility offerd by the ngong hills physical enviroment for individual Meditation3.Actualise on teambuilding activitiesContinue reading

Ngong hills hike

Our boys enjoyed Ngong hills hike over the weekend. The hike and beautiful scenes were therapeutic.

Holy Thursday mass at Rongai home.

Holy Thursday mass at Rongai home. Part of the mass was washing feet of 12 boys just like Jesus did to His twelve disciples. The boys were taught about servant leadership, forgiveness and loving oneContinue reading

Family therapy

On Saturday 1st April, 2023, we had our first family therapy this year. The objective of the event was family mediation which is a key step in the recovery journey of an addict. Amongst usContinue reading

What’s New this Month

Our Monthly  Parents Seminary

Our Monthly  Parents Seminar is at St. John

 

Stories

THE REALITY OF INFORMAL SETTLEMENTS IN NAIROBI

Kariobangi North informal settlement and the slum of Korogocho

Kariobangi North is one of Nairobi’s informal settlements (slums) located approximately 15 kms from Nairobi city centre. It started as a result of the increasing population pressure for houses occasioned by the rural-urban migration in the 1980’s; it essentially grew after the adjacent Kariobangi South estate became fully occupied. A huge percentage of the dwellers are the youth of between 15-30 years, from different tribal and cultural backgrounds. Karibangi North slum boost a population of more than 350,000 people all living in very poor conditions and lacking all fundamental services.

Dwellers of Kariobangi North are prone to high levels of insecurities; lack of water; insufficient disposal of solid and liquid waste; lack of employment; and numerous local brews brewing local drinks that are potentially lethal, but nevertheless common among slum dwellers.

As a result of the above, human right violations have been on the increase and at the same time HIV prevalence rates continue to be on the rise as well as insecurity, violence and a wide spread use of drugs especially among young people, many of whom live on the streets.

Part of Kariobangi is the infamous slum of Korogocho extends over an area of 1.square mile on the Eastern side of Nairobi in the Kasarani Constituency. The informal settlement sits partly on government land and partly on private land. With a population of 120,000 people, Korogocho is the fourth most populous informal settlement in Kenya. The majorities of the slum dwellers are victims of evictions in other areas of Nairobi, others have moved to the slum as a result of unemployment and rural-urban migration.

Whatever is their reason for settling in the Korogocho slum, the people live in congested shacks constructed of mud or scrap metal separated by narrow footpaths which serve both as sewers and drains. Scarcity of running water remains one of the most urgent problems of Korogocho combined with inadequate or missing infrastructures, employment, education, minimum health standards, and general isolation of the slum from law enforcement and social, economic and political development. The informal settlement borders the Dandora dumping site – the largest dumping site in Kenya. Many of the slum dwellers rely on the dumping site to collect used plastic bags, scrap metal, plastic bottles to sell them for economic gain.

Most of the young people in the slums of Kariobangi and Korogocho are unemployed, with little hope of getting any job or what awaits them in future. They are easy prey to negative peer influence, drugs and substance abuse, gangs and crime. Many of them suffer from breakdown in family values, child-headed families, prostitution and alcohol abuse leading to high rate of death due to HIV/AIDS, hence increased number of orphans. Hardships and harsh living conditions coupled with inadequate social services make children in Kariobangi and Korogocho extremely vulnerable to infectious diseases, illiteracy, a bleak future and a vicious cycle of poverty. Most of these youth end up on the streets and survive by sniffing glue to escape from hunger pangs while others scavenge for food at the dumpsite. School age girl spend their days at the dumpsite helping in baby-sitting their younger siblings while their single mothers scavenge for food and other valuables from garbage heaps. These girls hardly attend school.

It is in this context that the Comboni missionaries living and working in Kariobangi and Korogocho felt the need to establish three street youth rehabilitation centres as a solution to the problems faced by youth in the slum of Korogocho. The purpose of the rehabilitation programs is to transform the life of young people, educate them and help them to become responsible people. The rehabilitation programs are registered in Kenya as Napenda Kuishi Rehabilitation Program Trust (K) and the centers are certified as rehabilitation centers for youth with addiction; furthermore the residential facility is registered and certified by the Kenyan Government as a residential rehabilitation facility