Solicitors in Newcastle have responded to Kenya’s growing humanitarian crisis with a donation of funds to buy food, clothing and blankets for up to 20,000 homeless and displaced persons.


The lawyers have so far donated £1,000, a sum which David Gray, chairman of the Rift Valley Newcastle Justice Project, said would go a long way in a country where most people subsist on just $1 a day. He added: ‘But further contributions would, of course, be most welcome.’



The project is a charity set up ten years ago by Newcastle Law Society to fund a juvenile justice project in conjunction with Kenya’s Rift Valley Law Society. Nakuru, where the Rift Valley Law Society is based, has become a place of refuge for families escaping the ethnic violence in other parts of the country – with around 20,000 people now camping out on the town’s showground.



In a separate development, the Law Society of Kenya has approached the Law Society of England and Wales for help in challenging the country’s disputed election results. It is expected that the Kenyan electoral commission will be the subject of a judicial review.



Jonathan Rayner