According to the advisor in the office of the president on gender-based issues, Harriet Chigai most of the cases that happen in Busia are not reported to the relevant authorities.
Harriet says that Busia county is leading on matters of defilement in Kenya, with an institution registering 13,000 cases of defilement within three years is alarming.
She notes that poverty has made issues to do with violence against women and children go up leading to increase in cases of defilement, rape and incest in Busia.
Addressing the residence of Kolanya in Teso North in Busia County Chigai said that there is a need to sensitize the community on looking at women and children differently.
“We have very high cases of adolescent pregnancies in Busia, there are high cases of rape and sodomy that are not being reported to the authorities. The young ages between the ages of 2 to 22 years and cases of grandmothers are being raped,” she said.
She however, attributed the problem to alcohol and drug abuse which add to poverty urging the residents to avoid drug use which has been leading the county into the abbys.
“We have realized those are the gaps that we have and we are here to enlighten the women so that they can take advantage of the program that the government is currently having on matters of women’s economic empowerment and how to access government initiatives like NGAAF, Uwezo Fund among others.”
Ms Chigai further challenged the women to fashion their programs to align with economic activities to transit from farming to the full ecosystem of the value chain to benefit from the various industrial parks the government is putting in place.
She challenged the local and political leadership to speak about issues that are affecting the communities and help the government in reviewing to reduce cases of violence against women and children in Busia.
Busia woman representative Catherine Omanyo urged parents to be keen on their children to detect any changes they notice in their children’s lives early enough terming it as a red flag.
“People who defile children are people known to them, but the cases are hardly reported because of the way our society is. Society tends to hide these cases because of one reason or another.” Said the Busia woman representative.
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