Kenya making big strides towards gender equality through law reforms

businessdailyafrica.com - Women entrepreneurs at a meeting in Mombasa last year. Kenya aims to advance women’s economic participation and self-reliance by creating a conducive environment. PHOTO | FILE Last week, Kenya’s candidate for the African Union (AU) Commission chair, Amina Mohamed, lost to Chadian Moussa Mahamat despite her candidature looking promising.

Last year, Hillary Clinton lost to Donald Trump despite a promising campaign. The question on many people’s minds is whether the world ready for women in political leadership positions?

The 2016 US election opened up a lot of case studies on women and leadership positions. I would not be in a position to comment on that ( whether there was a gender card in the two elections), however in today’s rights that show that Kenya is one of the countries in the world with good legislative environment when it comes to women.

We have to understand these efforts against the backdrop of the Kenyan society where a lot of African cultures are male-oriented. The situation is not the same in the West where there have been equal rights for men and women for a much longer time.

Kenya Can Lead the Way to Universal Health Care in Africa

ipsnews.net - Kenya Can Lead the Way to Universal Health Care in Africa Siddharth Chatterjee is the UN Resident Coordinator to Kenya.

NAIROBI, Jan 16 2017 (IPS) - Consider this: every year, nearly one million Kenyans are pushed below the poverty line as a result of unaffordable health care expenses.

For many Kenyan families, the cost of health care is as distressing as the onset of illness and access to treatment. A majority of the population at risk can hardly afford the costs associated with basic health care and when faced with life threatening conditions, it is a double tragedy-inability to access health care and lack of resources to pay for the services.

According to the World Health Organisation, a large percentage of poor households in Kenya cannot afford health care without serious financial constraints as most are dependent on out of pocket payments to pay for services. Nearly four out of every five Kenyans have no access to medical insurance, thus a large part of the population is excluded from quality health care services.

The Blind Grandmother Giving HIV-Positive Kenyans Support and Dignity

This article originally appeared on the Women & Girls Hub of News Deeply, and you can find the original here. For important news about issues that affect women and girls in the developing world, you can sign up to the Women & Girls Hub email list. By Kalunde Kilonzo

Already blind, Catherine Mwayonga was written off by doctors as having six months to live after being diagnosed with HIV. Fifteen years later, she now helps other disabled HIV-positive Kenyans to demand better treatment and adapt to life with the disease.

NAIROBI, Kenya – When a visitor walks up the stony path to Catherine Mwayonga’s home in Thika, 30 minutes from the Kenyan capital, she hears their footsteps and raises her voice – bold and husky – to usher them in. She’s sitting on the sofa, knitting a sweater for a newborn baby and counting the stitches with her fingers. “Karibu sana (welcome),” she says.

Mwayonga, 62, the mother of six grown boys and two adopted daughters, is blind. She lost her eyesight when she was 7, after a cow kicked her in the head and threw her against a tree. She is also HIV-positive, which she only discovered when she overheard a doctor talking about her to his colleagues: “The patient on bed 12 is HIV-positive.”

Mwayonga remembers hearing him announce her status as she lay still on the cold bed, pretending to be asleep. “He said it in English, assuming that I did not understand,” she says. “It shocked me.”

That moment led to years of fear, denial and confusion as Mwayonga’s disability – one that had long ago become a natural part of her full life – suddenly became an impediment to coping with her illness. Everything from getting information from doctors to taking medication was a struggle. But 15 years on, Mwayonga has overcome those challenges and now devotes her time to advocating for HIV-positive people with disabilities, calling for more respect and improved resources.

The first case of HIV was discovered in Kenya in 1984, and the country’s infection rate currently stands at 5.6 percent. Figures from the Kenya National HIV and Aids Estimates shows it has the fourth highest HIV prevalence in the world, with about 1.6 million people infected with the virus.

For two years before her diagnosis, Mwayonga had pleaded with doctors to test her for HIV/AIDS. In 1996, after a decade of illness, her husband died from what Mwayonga later discovered were AIDS-related complications. She knew the risk of her having contracted HIV from him was high. “In 1999, I would have malaria today, typhoid tomorrow, but nothing specific,” she says. “I would ask why they were not testing me for HIV/AIDS. They would say the disease would not get [disabled] people like me. But I asked them: Aren’t I a human being?”

By the end of 2000, Mwayonga was ill more often than not. She had been teaching at the Thika Primary School for the Blind for 40 years, but now could only make it to work one month out of every three. “When I started vomiting, losing weight and having diarrhea, the doctors said my body was overproducing bile and I was put on ulcer medication.”

In March 2001, Mwayonga started having breathing difficulties and was rushed to hospital, where doctors told her she needed a blood transfusion. When the lab technician came to her bed to draw her blood, “I told him, I hope you will test me for HIV with that blood sample,” she says.

“Who told you about HIV/AIDS?” he asked her. That was the last she heard about her illness until the doctor announced her status as she pretended to sleep.

The poor handling of her situation continued, she says, when a doctor finally broke the news to her personally. He told her she had only six months to live, that she should sell her property and distribute her money to her family.

Devastated, “I told them it was very unprofessional how they were handling my case and how they had given my life an end,” she says. Some other doctors assured her that with the right diet and treatment, she could live with the disease for many more years. But she was never given or offered counseling to help her deal with her new, life-changing health status, nor given any tips on how to disclose the news to her family.

Instead, when she was discharged from hospital, she was handed an array of drugs to take daily. Because the antiretrovirals (ARVs) are not marked in Braille, she would often get her medication mixed up. “Every day, I felt tired and sleepy,” she says. “I was overdosing on the drugs. I had muscle wasting.”

This episode of her life, which she describes as a near-death experience, prompted her to share her status publicly in 2010. “Having HIV when you are disabled is a double dilemma,” she says. “Your privacy is infringed, your status is made public, and accessing and using ARVs is a hurdle. It is a major jungle for disabled HIV patients.”

There are places in Kenya, such as the Disabilities Programme at Liverpool VCT, an NGO where people with disabilities can access HIV testing and counseling services and get help from service providers specifically trained to work with the disabled. But there are very few facilities like this catering to disabled HIV patients.

So when Mwayonga isn’t teaching at the school, she devotes her time to filling that healthcare gap. As the head of the Thika branch of the Kenya Network of Positive Teachers (KENEPOTE), an organization of teachers living with HIV/AIDS, she helps organize regular outreach events to dispel myths on HIV, fight stigma and call for better inclusion of people living with the virus. She counsels elderly people on how best to break the news of their HIV-positive status to their children and grandchildren. She visits high schools to give talks on HIV prevention and treatment. And she opens up her home to anyone looking for help or advice on reproductive health.

But even simple advice like “use a condom” comes with complications. “When you tell a blind couple or someone visually impaired to use condoms, it is like an insult,” she says. “Because the packaging and instructions are only meant for those with sight. They wouldn’t know if the condom has expired, where to open it, and may not wear it correctly.”

Ultimately, Mwayonga wants the Kenyan government to pass legislation obliging manufacturers to put Braille, as well as large-sized letters, on condoms and packages of ARVs. She says all HIV testing centers should have a counselor who knows sign language to serve deaf clients and ensure their confidentiality.

In 2011, Mwayonga was among 15 women recognized by the National AIDS Control Council and the Network of People Living with HIV in Kenya (Nephak) for their championing for the rights of women living with HIV in Kenya.

“The disabled can also get HIV,” she says, stressing the importance of including the disabled in any policies or programs designed to tackle HIV prevalence in Kenya. “We cannot be left out.”

A Shallow Well Full of Hope for Women in Kenya’s Lamu County

This article originally appeared on the Women & Girls Hub of News Deeply, and you can find the original here. For important news about issues that affect women and girls in the developing world, you can sign up to the Women & Girls Hub email list. By Sophie Mbugua

In many areas of rural Kenya, women spend hours each day searching for water. As they worry about the impact on their families and livelihoods, one project could help them take back the time stolen by the search for water.

LAMU COUNTY, Kenya – Every morning at 3 a.m., Esther Katuma, a 34-year-old mother of five, leaves her house in search of water. She hopes to return before her children come home from school for lunch and in time to scare away the baboons that have been devouring the bananas and pawpaws on her farm.

Every day, she says, women like her from Maisha Masha village, near Lamu County’s Witu Forest, walk over 25 kilometers (15.5 miles) through the forest, dodging wild animals, some of which are also looking for water. “Everyone, including the animals – both wild and domestic livestock – depends on water wells within the forest,” says Katuma. “The earlier you get to the well, the earlier you return home to other chores.”

With no river running through the county, Lamu residents rely on shallow wells, water pans and boreholes to harvest groundwater. Until recently, the groundwater was regularly recharged by seasonal rainfall. But a dry spell has left the area water stressed, as wells and boreholes run low and any water left becomes too salty to drink. “The wells are turning saline due to lack of recharge owing to inadequate rainfall this year,” says Dishon Mwamburi, the director of water at the Ministry of Lands and Physical Planning.

Villagers – mainly the women – are forced to dedicate more and more of their time searching for water. But a new project is helping communities adapt to the water shortage, letting women get back to their livelihoods and their children.

Maisha Masha village is a relatively new settlement, built on a wetland that was meant to provide residents with a reliable water source. Natural or manmade areas that are seasonally or permanently flooded with water, wetlands make up 3 to 4 percent of Kenya’s land surface. But according to Mwamburi, unplanned settlements and an increased number of people and livestock in search of arable land have been encroaching on the wetlands over the past few years. At the same time, climate change has been leading to hotter dry seasons and shorter rainy seasons. Together, those factors have resulted in a water shortage.

For many women in Lamu County, the time spent looking for water is time away from their children. Damaris Kandenge worries that while she is busy on her long walks for water, her children are vulnerable to being targeted by the militia group al-Shabab, a militant Islamic group with ties to al-Qaida. “This forest is inhabited by the al-Shabab group,” she says. “I worry about my children. What if someone tries to recruit them and I never get to know about it?”

Kandenge, along with 20 women and 10 men, formed the Back to Eden group a year ago,to support their families through beekeeping and tree planting. She says other mothers in the group worry that, without supervision, their children are missing school or engaging in underage sex. Kandenge points to the fact that so far this year, the number of young girls getting pregnant is higher than in past years. “We have no time for the children,” she says. “When you return and find an empty bowl of food, you assume the children have come home for lunch.”

The long hours spent searching for water also lead to conflicts at home, says Kandenge, with some men engaging in extramarital affairs because, they say, their wives are neglecting them. “This water has become a thorn,” she says. “It’s a race between finding water, ensuring our children are safe and our men are happy – all in one woman.”

According to the 2015 Joint Monitoring Program by the World Health Organization and United Nations Children’s Fund, 2.6 billion people have gained access to improved drinking water sources since 1990. Despite the global achievements, Kandenge and Katuma are among 663 million people who are still without access to water globally.

Mwamburi says that due to financial constraints, there are no current plans to provide water solutions to Maisha Masha village. So the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) has stepped in to help. As part of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development IGADBiodiversity Management Programme, funded by the European Union, ICRAF has been working with Maisha Masha residents, promoting water technologies to help them access water and cope with rainfall variability. “We are combining roof catchment, rainwater harvesting, surface runoff and groundwater to ensure they have water available throughout the year,” says Wilfred Muriithi, a groundwater and agriculture engineer at ICRAF.

Muriithi and his team are helping the Back to Eden group build a freshwater shallow well that should be ready for use by the end of October. The hand-dug well, which costs over $500 and is co-funded by the community and ICRAF, taps into a flowing underground aquifer and should permanently serve the community, says Muriithi.

The shallow wells make use of natural aquifer’s in the ground to extract clean water flowing from the highlands to the ocean. An aquifer is an underground layer of water bearing, permeable rock that can be tapped into, providing a constant source of clean water.

Muriithi says the wells will provide a long-lasting solution to Lamu’s water as long as they are well maintained. “[Their] sustainability depends on the water usage and protection of the aquifers upstream,” he says.

Kandenge can’t hide her excitement as she talks about the benefits the shallow well will bring to her family and community. She plans to use it to rescue the vegetables and 2,000 seedlings currently drying up in her nursery, and for beekeeping and household use. And the time she will save not having to walk miles for water, she plans to spend with her family. “I cannot wait for this well to gush out water,” she says.

Childcare Crisis for Mothers in Nairobi Slums

This article originally appeared on the Women & Girls Hub of News Deeply, and you can find the original here. For important news about issues that affect women and girls in the developing world, you can sign up to the Women & Girls Hub email list. By William Davies

For women living in Kenya’s slums, lack of access to childcare can make going to work impossible. Those who can afford daycare struggle to find a place in overcrowded rooms packed with babies, while other mothers are forced to leave their children home alone.

NAIROBI – The fried potatoes that Linet Njeri sells on a rubbish-strewn street in Mathare, a slum in Nairobi, are delicious. She’s been selling bags of potatoes – lightly salted, warm and crisp – to passersby for 15 years. Crawling around Njeri’s feet, occasionally perilously close to the wood-burning stove that heats the frying oil, is her 16-month-old daughter, Rosemary. Njeri also has four other children. The oldest is manning a shop behind her, one is at school, and the other two she has left at home, alone.

“I’d like to expand my business, but I can’t because I can’t afford childcare,” says Njeri, who is a single mother. She says she feels lucky because she has her own business, and that means she can bring her youngest with her. “If I was employed, I don’t know what I would do.”

Most days Njeri makes around 600 shillings ($6), but from that she has to pay for the potatoes, wood and oil. “It is a struggle,” she says. “I have to keep Rosemary here with me. Daycare charges 100 shillings a day. It is too much.”

For mothers in Mathare and other slums across the Kenyan capital, lack of access to childcare is a major barrier to work – and to the path out of poverty. Nearly half of all Kenyan women aged 15 to 49 have a child under the age of five.

But because there are so few childcare options, especially in the slums, women face an almost impossible decision on a daily basis. Leave their babies home alone and go look for work, or stay with their children, but fail to earn enough money to feed them.

Kenyan women make up just under half of the workforce, but less than one in five of them have permanent jobs; the rest are casual workers. There are very few jobs that provide childcare, so women in the slums are forced to take on casual work, with the result being they never know if they’ll find work or not.

Walking through Mathare, home to some 300,000 people, a visitor can see several women with their babies tied to their backs as they bend over doing laundry. Other children, seemingly unaccompanied, play alone in the street.

Tucked down one alley, in a tin-roofed shack measuring about 3m (9.8ft) squared, 23 children are being looked after by three women. There are no windows, and the room is crammed with kids aged between six months and three years.

“This is one of the best daycare centers in Mathare,” says Judy Analo, 41, who brings her two grandchildren here every day. Before finding the center, she could only work alternate days with her daughter, as someone had to stay at home to look after two-year-old Tracy and 14-month-old Constantine. “It was so hard to find this place. I saw lots of other places, but this place is much better, as when you pick your children up they will be clean.”

The daycare, which doesn’t have an official name, is open six days a week, from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., but is oversubscribed. They regularly turn mothers away, as they can’t fit any more children into the room.

“Things are really bad,” says the owner, Veronica Ngesa. “Some people leave their children in the streets alone when they are just eight months old.” Others, she says, lock their babies and children in the house all day as they go to work. “There are so many children, so there is a real need for places like this.”

Ngesa’s daycare is supported by the British charity Tushinde, whose name means “Let’s succeed.” The funding pays for two meals a day for the children, many of whom arrive on their first day severely malnourished. The mothers, many of whom are single parents, each pay 30 shillings a day, which is still a struggle for some who might only earn a few hundred shillings a week.

“Many women are casual workers, so if they don’t go to work they don’t get paid,” says Sally Nduta, a social worker and development manager at Tushinde.

But for many women living in Kenya’s slums, even having the option to work is a luxury. “There is a great need for daycare. Forty-six percent of women who want daycare are not able to get good daycare for their children, so they can’t go to work,” says Nduta. “What we do is a drop in the ocean.” She wants the government to enact new laws to make companies provide childcare for those who need it.

Lucy Inziani does whatever work she can – laundry, cleaning, even manual labor – if it means she can provide for her children. Before finding the Tushinde daycare, she couldn’t work, and her family struggled to survive. “Other places are dirty,” she says. “Sometimes the rooms are very small and they are really congested.” It’s hard to imagine a more congested room than the one we are standing in, but all the women here say it’s spacious compared to others.

Even with the dire conditions, mothers who are able to access any daycare at all are the lucky ones. For thousands of others in the slum, earning enough money to survive means risking the health and well-being of their children on a daily basis.