Despite a law prohibiting child marriages in Kenya the practice is still rampant in rural areas, a report released by Plan International has found.

The report, released on Thursday (6 December) following research in eight rural areas, found 43% of girls interviewed and 11.6% of boys were married before 18. Both rates are higher than Kenya’s national rate, which stands at 34% for females and 1.4% for males.

Kenya’s new marriage bill outlaws child marriage and imposes stiff penalties to anyone who gets engaged or betrothed to an under 18-year-old. But Plan says many parents in rural Kenya marry off their children, particularly girls, as young as 14 due to the stigma associated with teen pregnancies and children being born out of wedlock. Many children are also married to enable a family to escape the pangs of poverty.

“Deeper analysis revealed that girls are either seen as an economic burden or valued as capital for their exchange value in terms of goods, money and livestock. It was also apparent that a combination of cultural, traditional and religious arguments were used to justify child marriages,” the report finds.

Chief guest, the Honourable Lady Justice Njoki Ndungu, said: “Globally 66 million girls of school going age are not in education. In Kenya, approximately two million girls of school going age are not in school. Only 47.6% of girls are enrolled into secondary schools compared to 52.4% of boys, and the gender gap widens the higher you go up the education ladder. In reality, one in five girls of lower secondary school age is out of school.”

Justice Ndungu pledged to spearhead active participation of the Executive, the Legislature and all other agencies and community structures responsible of protecting children to end child marriage.

In the report Barriers to girls’ education, access and transition, Plan finds that most parents who married off young girls did so to conceal pregnancy or avoid children born out of wedlock.

“Many parents marry off their daughters the moment they discover they are pregnant to protect their family status and name. The fear and stigma attached to premarital sex and bearing children outside marriage and associated family honour were cited as reasons for pushing girls into early marriage,” the report finds.

Plan’s report found most underage girls being married off were marrying significantly older men. Evidence also suggests that girls married before they turn 18 will be less educated and will go on to have more children.

Statistics show that Kilifi has the highest prevalence of child marriage in Kenya at 47.4%, followed by Homa Bay at 38%, Kwale at 37.9%, Bondo at 29.5% and Tharaka at 25.3%.

The report also indicates an increasing number of girls engaging in child labour within the household. The report found many girls are filling in for absentee parents, some of whom are employed elsewhere. This hinders girls from attending school, causing many to eventually drop out.

“Improving access to education for both girls and boys and eliminating gender gaps in education are important ways of ending the practice of child marriage,” says Samuel Musyoki, acting country director for Plan International in Kenya.

He added: “Lobbying and advocating for enforcement of laws [against] sex with under-age children and forced marriage can also be one of the approaches that can be employed to deal with these problems. At a governmental level, individual ministries need to work together to coordinate efforts to tackle the social and economic barriers to girls’ education that cut across multiple sectors.”

An assistant chief from Nkondo location in Tharaka said: “In this village there is a girl who was forced by circumstances to marry a boda-boda [bicycle taxi] man after her father, who was the family’s sole bread winner, died leaving her and her younger siblings with her ailing mother. Despite her good academic performance in school she had to drop out of school at the primary level to nurse her sick mother and take care of her other siblings. When she could not continue attending school regularly due to her added responsibility she opted to marry as she believed that her husband would support her family although she still had the desire to pursue education.”

Under its Because I am a girl campaign Plan is calling for a minimum of nine years schooling for girls and boys to ensure a better transition to the critical stage of secondary education.

Villagers in rural Epworth, about 15km east of Zimbabwe’s capital Harare, are determined to fight child abuse – but they are divided on how such cases should be dealt with.

Speaking at a forum organised by Padare/Enkundleni/Men’s Forum in Epworth, most villagers said they would report cases to the police even if it was not their child in order to fight against abuse in their community.

“We will not let these cases go unreported as child abuse is becoming an obstacle to the girl child’s future,” said one villager.

However, others said they would want to be financially compensated for what had happened. One villager said he would expect something in return if his child was harmed, hence reporting the case to the police would be a loss.

“I am not happy with that. If I report the case to the police, the culprit will be arrested but I will not get anything yet I would want to be compensated,” he said.

His sentiments were supported by another villager who said it was a waste of time reporting to the police that his girl child has been impregnated or raped because he would want to be compensated in the form of payment.

However, police officials who attended the gathering warned community members against accepting compensation without reporting rape cases.

Village head Iden Chitandariro, 57, congratulated the Padare/Enkundleni/Men’s Forum for such dialogues “because they enlighten many people.”

“We sometimes on our own discuss these issues but we are not taken seriously. But when police and other stakeholders come like this it helps our communities to better appreciate these issues. With the help of Padare we are trying by all means to sensitise the community to report these issues.

“Of course there is friction, it’s normal, but with time people will get to appreciate some of these issues,” Chitandariro said.

Padare/Enkundleni/Men’s Forum programme officer Nakai Nengomasha said the forums are aimed at reducing the high number of child the rapes in communities. Growing numbers of children are becoming victims of rape and sexual abuse due in part to high incidence of HIV and Aids coupled with the myth that if a man with HIV or Aids rapes a virgin he will be cured.

“We are saying let’s create platforms where people openly discuss some of these issues in an environment that is unthreatening, in an environment that is there to promote access to services. We are also facing challenges in the beginning, of people [unwilling] to talk about it but when they have the buy -in people are free to talk about it. Because some of these issues are so personal so most people are affected by these issues,” Nengomasha added.

Traditionally, in Zimbabwe it is taboo to discuss sexual education with adolescents. Normally policymakers and community leaders avoid discussions about sexual education because they do not want to provoke controversy. Some argue that it promotes promiscuity.

However, the 2011/2 Zimbabwe Young Adult Survey indicates that 71% of females aged 15 to 24 and almost all males (99%) of the same age had their first sexual experience before marriage.

It is clear from this that if issues of adolescent sexuality are not addressed a lot of our young men and women will not be able to achieve their full potential.

With this in mind, parliamentarians, traditional chiefs and youths met to discuss issues on how to disseminate information on sexual and reproductive health to young people. At the meeting, held under the topic Investing in young people in the future. Scaling up access to sexual and reproductive health and rights for adolescents and young people, Chief Fred Gambiza said the lack of dialogue between parents and children is a cause for concern as it creates a gap made worse by the amount of information children are now exposed to through the internet.

Obert Chigodora, a programme officer at Padare/Enkundleni/Mens Forum, said the forum has created adult-youth partnerships in communities through the use of pre-existing community structures to raise awareness on sexual and reproductive health (SRHR) issues.

“Through use of the planning and support tool we have managed to bring community ownership to the project. Songs have been composed, interesting names produced as evidence of embracing the project, and commitment charters developed,” Chigodora said.

Leo Munyoho of Students and Youth Working on Reproductive Health Action Team (SAYWHAT) said sporting events remain a key mobiliser of young people and can be very effective platforms to reach out to youth with SRHR information.

The opinion from various youth organisations was that the way some national education and communication materials have been produced make it difficult for local people to identify with them.

Groups also said a tool for interpreting and evaluating programmes was difficult to use and that the collapse of certain youth networks meant it was proving difficult to coordinate activities at community level. The emerging trend of young people moving from one place to another in search of livelihood was also raised.

The meeting was organised by SAfAIDS and also attended by officials from Women’s Action Group, Batanai HIV and AIDS organisation and Bezekela Home Based Care.

Ayatollah, 15, comes from one of Giza villages in Egypt. She talks about how she was forced to marry at an early age.

“I used to play in the street like all children in our village. One day, my parents forced me to drop out of school to help support our family. My father told my mother that girls don’t need education and that from then on, I was to herd the cattle from sunrise to sunset. Then, I would eat a bit and maybe relax and go out to play with my friends,” says Ayatollah.

“One day, I was playing with my friends. My father, accompanied by an old man who is a contractor and lives next door walked to me and shouted, saying I shouldn’t be playing in the street as I had reached the age for marriage. Two days later, my mother told me that dad married me off to save the family from poverty,” she recalls.

“I learnt that my husband to be was the same old man who lived next door, I told my mother that he was too old to marry me. She replied saying he is very rich and will hire your father in his company and that marriage is good for girls.”

Ayatollah is just one of millions of girls in Africa who experience forced early marriage and miss out on an education against their will.

“I could not say anything, as it was a taboo for girls in our village to object to anything our parents said, in regard to marriage and especially when the man is very rich,” says Ayatollah.

Ayatollah was obedient and married off to the old man. “After a while, I started visiting doctors as my husband wanted to have a child with me even though he has already six children from his first wife! Every doctor said ‘have mercy on this little girl and her body is not ready to bear a child’,” she recalls.

“Nobody seemed understand that I am biologically not fit for bearing children. I know that having babies is a need and necessity but not for children like me…,”she laments.

Despite her experience, she still has hopes: “I wish there had been more help in my village to stop this. Help me find a solution to make this a better place for the other young girls.”

Plan international is calling for increased investment in girls’ education through its global campaign, Because I Am A Girl.

The report, released yesterday by global children’s charity Plan International (Plan) for the International Day of the Girl Child, finds that although the abolition of school fees in most African countries has resulted in 52 million children enrolling in primary school over the past 10 years, 29 million children still remain out of school.

The report, released during the launch of Plan’s new, three-year Because I am girl campaign, finds that although school enrolment of African girls’ has increased in the last decade from 54% to 74%, around 16 million remain absent from school.

The report, entitled Progress and Obstacles to Girls education in Africa, finds huge national variations between school attendance. In Ethiopia, for instance, girls’ enrolment has leapt from 30% to 75% over a decade, while in countries such as Niger and Eritrea it remains well under 60%.

Suggesting the difference school attendance can have on a girl’s sense of empowerment, the report quotes Latifa Ababor, a 15-year-old from Jimma, Ethiopia, as saying: “No one can marry me off without my consent. I am not interested in marrying a man I don’t love and secondly am not ready to become somebody’s wife at this age.”

Plan is warning that, if the situation remains unchecked, it will put pay to hopes of achieving universal primary education by 2015. The reports states: “Despite the progress made in primary school enrolment in Africa over the past decade, the likelihood of achieving primary education in Africa by 2015 thus looks increasingly remote.”

Plan also finds the transit rate from primary to secondary education across sub-Saharan Africa to be at 62%, but less than a quarter of secondary school-aged girls are enrolled in secondary education.

A recent report by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) says access to primary school in South Sudan is one of the lowest in the world with only 22% of school-ages children (7-14) currently in school.

“It is indefensible that so many girls are still denied the right to education. This absence from school is not only unjust but it has a tragic and long-lasting impact upon the lives of so many girls and should no longer be tolerated. Our work has shown that supporting girls’ education is one of the single best investments we can make to help them break the cycle of poverty,” said Gezahegn Kebede, Plan’s Regional Director for Eastern and Southern Africa.

When Wamuyu got pregnant it was the last thing she had expected. She claims to have used the morning-after pill the morning after the night she had unprotected sex. What happened remains a mystery to her because she had used this pill many other times and was successful. She shared the shocking news to her then boyfriend who was two years her junior in the same university and the two young minds resolved to terminate the pregnancy.

This action, they justified, was to protect Wamuyu’s career that would have otherwise been at stake. She had to choose between the devil and the sea – one of the two had to be terminated – the pregnancy or her education. She chose the latter, a decision whose memories make her cry 12 years later. After graduation, she landed a prominent job but misery remained painted on her face for a long time with ‘the secret’, as she calls it, threatening to burst her heart open. And although she eventually somehow managed to share her secret with someone who encouraged her and is now a happily married step-mother of three, today she can’t help shedding tears as she narrated her ordeal to me.

“This is a permanent situation, I will never enjoy pregnancy or child-birth,” she says.

Dr. Dan Okoro, a Kenya-based gynaecologist, says that many people are not aware of the safe abortion guidelines stipulated by World Health Organisation (WHO). As a result, infections that prompt the surgical removal of the uterus usually occur. Dr. Okoro encourages people to read and understand the contents of the guidelines before resorting to an unsafe abortion. He points out that while there is counseling prior to such an operation, some come in as emergencies and others may not look like they will end up in surgery.

The WHO guidelines (2003) require that any person going for a pregnancy should be educated in a simple, clear language on what abortion entails. In Kenya, medical termination of a pregnancy is mostly recommended when the life of the pregnant mother is compromised or permanent damage of her body is threatening.

Under-18-year-olds who want to terminate a pregnancy should have the consent of their parents as stipulated in the Convention on the Rights of Child. But sadly, most of the abortions that younger females experience are done behind the parents’ backs for fear of intimidation and rebuke. A student in Maseno University in Kenya reveals how many girls opt to terminate pregnancies because parents threaten to stop paying their school fees and others bully the girl to disclose who the father of the unborn child is. “It may have been a one night business and there was no commitment in the sexual relationship!” the student said.

Wamuyu’s unsafe abortion could have been avoided if only she and her boyfriend had adequate knowledge on the subject of sexual and reproductive health (SRH). But many African countries still consider it a contradiction of culture to speak on sex to their growing children.

There is urgent need for more education to enable young women to understand the dangers and consequences of unsafe abortions. SRH is vital to any girl who is at their puberty age to decrease the number of HIV/STI infections, unintended pregnancies and subsequent unsafe abortions.

Another Nairobi student, Edward M. Mwenda expresses the importance of open discussions between parents and their children, saying that the media misleads children in the absence of their parents’ guidance. “Soap operas can be very misleading to an ignorant child,” notes Mwenda. He says that parents should discuss SRH with their children the same way they help the juniors with their home-work.

The 23 year old law-student further said that unsafe abortion and repercussions such as the one Wamuyu experienced will not end unless parents, the government and other stakeholders intensify SRH education among the youth.

*The name of Wamuyu has been changed to protect the identity of the woman involved

Akinyi is 16 and homeless. She was born and brought up in the streets of Nairobi. She has scant knowledge of her parents; the only thing she can vaguely remember is that her mother was a beggar in the Nairobi streets. They slept in the garbage heaps near Nairobi’s Marigiti market along Haile Selassie Road.

When Akinyi was barely six-years-old, her mother would send her out to beg for money and food in the busy streets. Akinyi would always find her way back to the garbage heap, which was the only home she knew. Her mother would spend the day collecting waste vegetables, which they would cook and eat. Akinyi had no idea that her mother had mental health problems until when she was found dead, having been raped and left for dead. As a crowd formed around her body she heard some talking about her mother’s mental challenges.

“I was very young but I remember that day as if it were yesterday,” recalls Akinyi. After her mother’s death Akinyi joined other street children, engulfed by loneliness and loss.

Soon Akinyi was introduced to drug use and was sexually abused. She was raped many times by older boys, which is how she got little Taabu. He is only 2-years-old. Taabu is a Kiswahili word meaning trouble. Akinyi says the name is suitable because she got him at the peak of her troubles. She got the baby at only 14, in poverty and loneliness. How she survived the delivery assisted by older street women is a miracle.

Akinyi continues begging in the streets to feed her child. She is completely illiterate and doubts whether her child will ever go school. Many times, Akinyi has to have sex with older males for food and protection.

I asked Akinyi if she knows anything about HIV and she has very little information about the epidemic. If anything she seemed to be more scared of another pregnancy than HIV or an STI. Strangely, Akinyi has never been infected with a severe STI although she has never been tested for HIV. From the description of her lifestyle, the young mother seems to have no knowledge of family planning methods or how to negotiate for safer sex.

While there are many organisations that have projects whose aim is to improve health, welfare and the quality of life of street children, Akinyi says that no one has introduced her to family planning methods or HIV prevention information. However, she is quick to point out that street children have a fear of any person or group that looks like they are government-associated. This is due to the harassment they often receive from police officers.

“Police officers do not understand that if I had a home, I would not spend another night in the cold trenches,” laments Akinyi.

In March this year Malindi Provincial Administration carried out an exercise to ‘clean up’ the streets of street children whom it described as a tourist threat. The children were reported to have been stealing from tourists and robbing them of jewellery and other valuables. In the majority of cases, children if caught would be arrested only to come back to the streets shortly for lack of another place to go.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) defines street children as casualties of economic growth, war, poverty, domestic violence and physical and mental abuse. In research carried out by United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) it was established that many street children run away from their homes due to abuse, neglect, violence or poverty.

According to a WHO toolkit on working with street children, street girls are less visible to researchers or educators because they are fewer than boys. This is because girls have fewer behavioural problems and culturally, only a few of them are rebellious to their parents, meaning many stay in the home even when facing neglect, violence and abuse. In some Kenyan communities, girls are married off at an early age when their parents want to get rid of them.

Street children are challenged by health and safety hazards. Girls are sometimes forced to sell sex or become tip-offs for gangsters in order to survive. Yet their health issues are barely addressed since they are looked upon like a disturbance in the society.

There is need to identify street girls and give them information and education in order to decrease the number of unintended pregnancies and subsequent increase of street children, and the spread of HIV and other STIs. Even as different organisations keep on addressing the plight of street girls it is evident that the rate of children born and brought up in the street is still an issue that needs redress.

Under the scheme, the Ministry of Labour and Social Services, with support from World Education (WEI), will review its health insurance scheme, which operates through Assisted Medical Treatment Orders, then develop an improved one.

According to a ministry spokesperson, this is a statutory programme mostly funded through the national budget and is now part of the National Action Plan for Orphans and Vulnerable children (NAP II).

The health assistance scheme aims to provide access to health and other emergency support services for the most vulnerable children. This includes referring them to other vital services for nutrition, health (e.g. antiretroviral treatment) and livelihoods.

lt is also understood that the department responsible for the scheme has for years been dogged by budgetary and operational challenges and there is a need to revitalise its systems to ensure that health is accessible to vulnerable groups in society for an improved national health capital base.

Mother and daughter found refugee in Soroti town. However, one morning when Maria had gone to collect water from a nearby borehole, a woman from the neighbourhood picked her daughter from their new home and took her to Soroti police station. It was alleged that Maria had trafficked the child. On reaching the police station, Maria was apprehended and accused of child trafficking. She was also accused of neglect and abusing the child’s rights because she had left her with no one. She furnished police with information on her parentage of the child and was released as investigations continued. Meanwhile, the baby was taken to Amecet Ainapakin children’s home in Soroti.

Roy Ocira, the probation and social welfare officer of Soroti, ran advertisements in the New Vision and Etop daily newsprints asking for fostering and adoption of the child in accordance with provisions of the Children’s Act. Radio announcements were also aired. On learning of these developments, Maria approached Amecet and asked to take away her child. However, she was referred to the Soroti probation officer to first ascertain her relationship with the child.

Ocira initiated a social inquiry. This was carried out with support from SUNRISE OVC Uganda, a USAID-funded project being implemented by Alliance Uganda to improve services for orphans and vulnerable children. Also supporting the inquiry team were FOCRE/War Child, and the Technical Support Organisation (TSO) North East. The inquiry staff travelled with Maria to Katakwi to trace her relatives so as to confirm her relationship with Apio. In Katakwi, the team interacted with Maria’s brothers and other residents of Olilim village. The brothers confirmed that Maria was their sister who disappeared from home due to economic hardships.

The team further supported Maria to undergo an HIV test. She was found HIV positive. Maria was shocked but after counselling she was initiated on antiretroviral treatment to enable her to live positively. Maria and her brothers were also counselled about Apio’s health status as she was also found to be HIV positive. After the sessions, Maria’s brothers expressed willingness to support both mother and child, however they asked them to come back and settle in the family.

The children’s home where Apio had been staying proposed to Maria’s relatives to acquire skills to take care of the sick and malnourished child before her return. Once Apio’s health improves, child and mother will be reunited to live in their home environment. After this reunification, support of the family members with food, milk and love should greatly improve Apio and Maria’s lives further.

Dr. David Bitiira, a monitoring and evaluation specialist at SUNRISE, said: “We followed up Maria, counselled her with the help of USAID and other partners to reach her home and trace her family, this is one of the most successful peace reconciliation with the family members we have achieved.”

According to the Uganda National Household Survey, children in Uganda constitute 57% of the total population of 30.7 million people – this amounts to an estimated 17.1 million children below the age of 18 years. Of these, 14% (2.43 million) will have lost at least one parent. Just under half (1,108,080) will have lost parents due to HIV. A total of 105,000 children between the ages of 0-14 are HIV positive.

Currently, at least one in every four Ugandan households has an orphan and three million children live below the poverty line. Just over half (8.1 million children) are classed as living in circumstance that make them either critically or moderately vulnerable, while 63% live with caregivers other than their biological parents. That Apio did live with her biological mother and was then removed created suffering for both mother and child.

HIV prevalence in Uganda currently stands at approximately 6.5%, while the prevalence in children aged 0-5 years is 0.7%. Mother to child transmission contributes 22% of new HIV infections. The National Early Infant Diagnosis (EID) database shows that the percentage of infants born to HIV-infected mothers stood at 9.9% as of 2009. The HIV and AIDS Epidemiological Surveillance Report (Uganda Ministry of Health 2009) shows that a total of 120,000 children aged 0 to 14 had died of AIDS- related complications, while the number of those living with HIV and AIDS is 42, 140.

The greatest challenges facing children affected by HIV/AIDS or those who seek to help them are

• Discrimination and stigmatisation among fellow children at school and among others
• Inaccessibility to ART for children
• Poor referral for accessing other care services such as food
• Lack of child counsellors

A series of presentations addressed issues facing one particular group living with HIV – which over the years has often been neglected, falling between the monoliths of paediatric and adult HIV – young people and adolescents. They continue to experience significant gaps in services and facilities, even three decades in to the HIV pandemic.

Attending school is key to the successful social and psychological development of young people and adolescents, and a study from Botswana, presented at AIDS 2012 by Gabriel Letamo, examined the experience of 900 school age young people living with HIV. Of these, 99% attend school regularly. The majority (98.6%) value school for a range of reasons, including meeting friends, learning and the hope it provides.

However, 77% had experienced problems throughout school including ill health, missing lessons due to medical appointments, dropping grades and being party to unanswered questions about HIV. To cope with these challenges many experience self-isolation, non-disclosure, and non-participation in school trips. More positively, almost half (48.2%) approach their teachers to discuss issues, and 19.5% speak to relatives. This study suggests that children and young people value school – “I go to school because I have a future” according to one respondent.

How do young people deal with being newly diagnosed? This was addressed by another presenter, Gary Hopper. He described a study from Kenya suggesting young people can, and do, develop ways of dealing with their HIV status through ‘resilience’: a dynamic process of positive adaptation. In this qualitative study undertaken in Kibera – a large slum outside of Nairobi – findings from a series of focus groups with 82 young people living with HIV aged 18 to 25 confirm that this group develops resilience using seven forms of coping strategy, including accepting their HIV positive identity, disclosing their HIV status to supportive others and re-engaging with friends for social activities. Primary sources of social support included romantic partners, friends, and people living with HIV. The inter- and intra-personal resilience revealed in this study highlight ways that young people are able to adapt to their new HIV status.

For adolescents living with HIV (aged 10-19), negotiating this difficult developmental stage can be additionally hard, and requires strategic and sustainable service support. In an important presentation, Fabian Cataldo (Research Director of Dignitas, based in Malawi) reported a four-country study investigating the experiences and challenges in sexual and reproductive health for adolescents living with HIV. Data were collected from Botswana, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe using a range of methods including interviews, focus groups, observation and survey. Findings reveal significant gaps in age-appropriate support and care, and there is clearly inadequate support for adolescents as they embark on sexual and love relationships. In addition, healthcare workers lack appropriate insights into how to enable adolescents to disclose, negotiate choices about relationships, and how to provide an ‘adolescent friendly’ environment.

What interventions can help? The final presentation to consider here came from Lima, Peru. Desiree Salazar Ramirez described an intriguing initiative aiming to provide children and adolescents with “a caring, quality and confidential service.” Activities included training 31 adolescents living with HIV in self-care and human rights, 45 community leaders in issues around HIV, and 73 teachers on HIV in young people and stigma. Afterwards, young people and adolescents living with HIV were reported as being more assertive and self-confident, and benefiting from a more informed community and education setting.

This range of diverse presentations is an important reminder not to allow this vulnerable group to disappear off the radar.

It is perhaps ironic that the increasing number of young people living with HIV is largely a product of the dramatic rollout of anti-retroviral treatment (ART) in recent years. HIV-infected children are now surviving for much longer, and programmes must be expanded to adapt to this changing demographic.

What we heard this afternoon confirms that, although young people living with HIV face a range of difficulties, they are by no means ‘passive victims.’ They seek solutions; growing and benefiting from programmes designed to empower them as they transition into adulthood.

As one respondent from the Kenyan study describes, the aim of our endeavours must be to encourage young people living with HIV to “feel like any other child, and accept the person I [am].”