Pope Francis denounced the conditions slum-dwellers are forced to
live in today, saying that access to safe water is a basic human right
and that everyone should have dignified, adequate housing.
Francis insisted on access to a basic sewage system, rubbish collection, electricity as well as schools, hospitals and sport facilities during a visit to the Kangemi slum on Nairobi’s northwestern edge.
The Pope has frequently insisted on the need for the three “Ls” — land, labour and lodging — and on Friday he focused on lodging as a critical issue facing the world amid rapid urbanisation that is helping to upset Earth’s delicate ecological balance.
Kangemi is one of 11 slums dotting Nairobi, East Africa’s largest city. The shanty itself has about 50,000 residents living without basic sanitation. Most of the capital’s slums comprise a maze of single-room mud structures with iron-sheet roofing or cramped, high-rise buildings.
Francis denounced the “injustice of urban exclusion” and the similar unfair distribution of land.
“These are wounds inflicted by minorities who cling to power and wealth, who selfishly squander while a growing majority is forced to flee to abandoned, filthy and run-down peripheries,” Francis said.
“To deny a family water, under any bureaucratic pretext whatsoever, is a great injustice, especially when one profits from this need,” he said.
Francis told the residents that people forced to live in slums actually share values that wealthier neighbourhoods can learn from: solidarity and looking out for the poor. But he said it was unjust that entire families are forced to live in unfit housing, often at exorbitant prices.
He called for a “respectful urban integration” with concrete initiatives to provide good quality housing for all.
Francis referred to the problem of urban shanties in his speech to the African UN headquarters on Thursday, saying everyone has a basic right to “dignified living conditions,” and that the views of local residents must be taken into account when urban planners are designing new construction.
“This will help eliminate the many instances of inequality and pockets of urban poverty, which are not simply economic but also, and above all, social and environmental,” he said.
In Kangemi, the parish of St Joseph erupted in cheers with the arrival of Francis.
Francis insisted on access to a basic sewage system, rubbish collection, electricity as well as schools, hospitals and sport facilities during a visit to the Kangemi slum on Nairobi’s northwestern edge.
The Pope has frequently insisted on the need for the three “Ls” — land, labour and lodging — and on Friday he focused on lodging as a critical issue facing the world amid rapid urbanisation that is helping to upset Earth’s delicate ecological balance.
Kangemi is one of 11 slums dotting Nairobi, East Africa’s largest city. The shanty itself has about 50,000 residents living without basic sanitation. Most of the capital’s slums comprise a maze of single-room mud structures with iron-sheet roofing or cramped, high-rise buildings.
Francis denounced the “injustice of urban exclusion” and the similar unfair distribution of land.
“These are wounds inflicted by minorities who cling to power and wealth, who selfishly squander while a growing majority is forced to flee to abandoned, filthy and run-down peripheries,” Francis said.
“To deny a family water, under any bureaucratic pretext whatsoever, is a great injustice, especially when one profits from this need,” he said.
Francis told the residents that people forced to live in slums actually share values that wealthier neighbourhoods can learn from: solidarity and looking out for the poor. But he said it was unjust that entire families are forced to live in unfit housing, often at exorbitant prices.
He called for a “respectful urban integration” with concrete initiatives to provide good quality housing for all.
Francis referred to the problem of urban shanties in his speech to the African UN headquarters on Thursday, saying everyone has a basic right to “dignified living conditions,” and that the views of local residents must be taken into account when urban planners are designing new construction.
“This will help eliminate the many instances of inequality and pockets of urban poverty, which are not simply economic but also, and above all, social and environmental,” he said.
In Kangemi, the parish of St Joseph erupted in cheers with the arrival of Francis.
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