Chiggai, Juma speak out on femicide

When the Office of the President’s Adviser on Women Rights broke its silence on the killing of women yesterday, it was a little too late for a country that is mourning the deaths of more than 100 of its daughters in October alone.

This year, women have died in very horrendous circumstances, starting from the shocking discovery of severely mutilated female bodies in an abandoned quarry in Mukuru slums to many other cases of femicide linked to love triangles reported countrywide.

The adviser’s office has been in existence for two years now and to prove its existence, it sprung up yesterday, hosting a meeting where highly charged feministic undertones took centre stage.

Strategic direction

Yesterday’s meeting culminated in the launch of a document titled Strategic Direction that stipulates several targets that the Office intends to achieve.

However, the document was long on generalisation and short on substance on issues affecting women despite being given a seat on the President’s table.

“Working towards the elimination of all forms of violence against women and girls 100%,” one of the targets reads without disclosing how this ambition would be achieved among the vulnerable females.

Addressing the guests, the Office’s Chief Executive Officer Hariette Chiggai dispelled the notion that her agency was created with no clearly defined roles.

“When we invent offices, there are fears that come along. And that is why for us, this meeting was very important. Everybody asks me: Was this office put in place to advise? And if it was to advise, where does it sit? Is it a dark corner office? That is what advisory looks like,” she said.

Chiggai added: “We must advise based on data. We must advise based on what is real, what is needed and what needs to be done. That is what I hope we can do.”

Societal approach

While pointing out that gender-based violence affects both men and women, Chiggai called on a whole-of-society approach towards tackling issues that affect the communities.

“We need everybody involved. In urban centres, young boys are being raped and the statistics are bad. In Mukuru slums last year, we had 1,638 raped boys. The oldest raped woman is 83 years old. And there are many. The youngest is five months old,” she stated.

In the past two years, Chiggai said that her office has been engaging women in the counties as well as civil society, county governments and women leaders in the regulatory commissions and agencies to drive the gender agenda.

On her part, the President’s Adviser on National Security, Dr. Monica Juma said that Chiggai’s office must lead from the front in the wake of violence and killings targeting women currently being experienced across the country.

“The role of the Office of the Women’s Rights Advisory, in my view, is to help us to drive a momentum that is required to keep our women safe, to enable and empower them, to secure their dreams, to guarantee their prosperity, and to secure society,” Juma said.

Juma said that women must be empowered to take up leadership positions in all sectors including those dominated by men if the country is to be secure and stable for both genders.

“In a community where you will see a woman walking at 10 o’clock in the night, it is assured that the society is secure. Securing of women, is a very good indicator of the level of security and public safety, and therefore the possibility of a country thriving,” she stated.

Women empowered

Juma revealed that in the security sector, women are more empowered than ever before in the history of the country adding that during the recruitment exercises, one in every three recruits is a woman. At the command level of Kenya Defence Forces (KDF), Juma said that 150 women officers are occupying those ranks while in the National Police Service (NPS) 40 women are serving in the Specialised Weapon and Tactics (SWAT) unit.

“We shall be deploying a woman SWAT team in Haiti. There is a degree of sensibility when security is delivered by a woman. We want to deliver a message to women and girls in Haiti that it is possible and that there is hope for the future,” she added.