Armed with a university certificate, Hussein Al-Haji returned to her pastoralist community in Garissa, northeastern Kenya, expecting to serve as a veterinary health assistant.
But she was refused the job because she was a woman. She was told she couldn’t treat their animals because she menstruates – this would make their cows perish.
Al-Haji and a colleague then started a local NGO, WOMANKIND Kenya (WOKIKE) to provide leadership training to women. They also set up a sanctuary for girls at risk of female genital mutilation/cutting.
The invisibility of women in most writings about global and international developments has meant that the labor, cultures and histories of women are rarely taken into account, or, when they have been taken into account, women are most often seen as lacking agency – as merely victims in a society of cruel and unjust inequalities.
Social and cultural norms continue to undermine ongoing legal and administrative efforts, helping to sustain gender inequalities, which hinder women and girls from fully exercising their rights and make them vulnerable to preventable death and disability.
Kenyan Situation
According to the 2014 Kenya Demographic and Health Survey of Kenya, 4 out of every 10 Kenyan women undergo some form of violence, whether physical or sexual. This figure is staggering and should compel us to pause and reflect.
At least 32 percent of Kenyan women have undergone Female genital mutilation/cutting, according to a report by the Population Council. Among communities such as the Somali, Abagusii, Kuria, Maasai and Samburu, more than 90 percent of women undergo it.
Female genital mutilation/cutting often takes place in unsterile surroundings using rudimentary instruments (Inset)
“You are discriminated against either way by the community if you have not been circumcised and by friends in schools outside northeastern if you have been circumcised,” Hafsa, who went to a high school in eastern Kenya, said.
Role of Women
According to a report by IRIN, a woman in a typical Somali household is needed for cooking, taking care of small babies, and it is for this reason that girls are often pulled out of school.
Many of the girls suffer FGM/C and cannot report the practitioners. “In April, a girl who underwent FGM bled to death. The circumciser was arrested, and then released. If you try to intervene, you end up being accused by the woman herself of interfering,” she said.
Recently, during the Pope’s visit to Kenya, he said that violence against women needs to be dealt with. He said at a Mass at the University of Nairobi on Thursday, 26 Nov 2015 that, “In obedience to God’s word, we are called to resist practices which hurt or demean women and threaten the life of the unborn.”
Until all women and girls are safe at home, no one will be safe outside the home.
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