Alarm over high rates of GBV in Turkana

Concerns have been raised over high rates of gender-based violence in Turkana county with leaders, activists and the public racing to arrest the situation.

This is after data from the national crime centre showed that rape in the county currently stands at 34.6 per cent against the national average of 12.9 per cent.

Cases of assault stands at 35.7 per cent compared with the national average of 15.7 per cent. The rate of child abuse, including neglect and other sexual abuse, stands at 23.7 per cent compared with the 4.3 per cent national average.

Also of greater concern is an emerging trend of drug abuse in the region, something that has been attributed to the Kakuma refugee camp.

The camp located in Turkana plays host to more than 197,000 refugees and asylum-seekers from 19 countries, including South Sudan, Sudan, Somalia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi and Ethiopia.

According to the county Health CEC Jane Ajele, the camp has opened women and girls to a lot of vulnerabilities thus leading to a rise in GBV.

“There are certain issues that were not in Turkana county before like issues of drug abuse and these things are nowadays there and this has increased issues of gender based violence,” Ajele said.

“When you go to Kakuma we have a huge population of refugees there and you see once you bring people from other countries and they come to a certain place they bring all the issues that were not known there,” she added.

Last week, partners rolled out two projects that targets at least 24,000 women, men, girls, and boys drawn from both host community and refugees in Kalobeyie integrated settlement.

The two dubbed ‘Together’ and ‘She soars’ have been funded by the Global Affairs Canada and will be implementing gender transformative initiatives to increase the enjoyment of health-related human rights for the most vulnerable adolescent girls, women, and children under five years.

The Together project is a six-year initiative targeting most vulnerable adolescent girls and boys (10-19 years), women and men (20-24 years) and children under five years, especially those with intersecting vulnerabilities, in indigenous, remote or refugee resettlement settings in Kenya, Cambodia, Philippines, and Uganda.

In Kenya, it seeks to increase women and adolescent girls' knowledge and capacity to exercise their health rights as well as improve health and nutrition services, that respond to the unique needs of women and adolescent girls.

SHE SOARS on the other hand is a seven-year project that targets vulnerable women and girls particularly out if school adolescents aged 10 to 19 years and is being implemented in Kajiado, Siaya, Kisumu and Nairobi counties.

The two projects are estimated to cost Sh622 million each.

“When young girls and women do not have access to sexual and reproductive health information and services, they find themselves pregnant, married off at an early age, out of school, being judged negatively and sometimes abandoned by their families, communities and peers,” Canadian High Commissioner Christopher Thornley said.

According to lead officer family planning at the Health Ministry Estella Waiguru, 21 per cent of girls between the ages of 15 to 24 years have experienced some form of GBV.

More than 60 per cent of sexual GBV cases reported through the Kenya Health information System are with girls below the age of 18 years.

“We continue to see a lot of headway made in the health system but challenges exist when it comes to access to health services, health facilities, quality of information we collect, governance and health financing,” Waiguru said.

(Edited by V. Graham)