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Summary: Fifty-five per cent of the survivors of sexual gender based violence are children below 15 years, 83 per cent of whom are girls, with rape and sodomy constituting 86 per cent of reported cases, and 75 per cent of perpetrators being persons known to victims as either neighbours, relatives or close family friends.
[14 September 2012] - Contrary to expectations, more of children and adolescents than women are being referred to Kenya’s Sexual Gender Based Violence Recovery Centres, a study from Coast General Hospital in Mombasa has shown. Revealing the study during the ongoing Integration for Impact 2012 conference in Nairobi, Kenya, Lou Dierick, director of support services at the International Centre for Reproductive Health, said when the Sexual Gender Based Violence Recovery Centres were formed in Kenya, those behind the move thought they would see mostly women being referred. He said the revelations from the Mombasa observations call for policy change that would integrate Sexual Gender Based Violence Recovery Centres in public health system. “What the SGBVRC prove today is that child sexual violence exists but communities still treat it as a taboo,” he said. According to Dr Soita Musimbi, children are the majority of survivors brought to the Sexual Gender Based Violence Recovery Centres in Mombasa, which caters for the population around the Coast Province. Dr Musimbi revealed that 55 per cent of the survivors of sexual gender based violence are children below 15 years, 83 per cent of whom are girls. Rape and sodomy constitute 86 per cent of reported cases. Dr Musimbi said 75 per cent of perpetrators are known to victims and they are either neighbours, relatives or close family friends. Wilkister Bosire, of Haki Yenu project, told participants that a rape is reported in Kenya every 30 minutes and that 12 per cent of Kenyan women say their [first sexual encounter] was through coercion. Dierick said mid‐ to long term factors that tend to let communities accept and tolerate rape, intimate partner violence and sexual abuse of children must be addressed. He added that the lack of sexual child abuse data compounds campaigns against the [problem]. He said many communities in Mombasa know the problem exists but it is shrouded in silence, and assumed to be a culturally taboo issue. However, he said Sexual Gender Based Violence Recovery Centres have shown that there is hope, although change may take time and require long term campaigns to achieve the needed change of attitudes. “This will be done through several meetings, events and campaigns,” he added. Dierick said lessons from Mombasa show that tackling sexual gender based violence requires an interdisciplinary approach involving medical, psycho‐social and legal players. He called integration of Sexual Gender Based Violence Recovery Centres in public health facilities and not to be treated as a temporary intervention as the mood is right now. But he said integration will require investment in forensics equipment, supplies and trained personnel, training of paralegals for community work, casualty staff, creation of referral services and rolling out gender based violence recovery centres from provincial to district levels. Elizabeth Aroka, of the Sexual Gender Based Violence Recovery Centre in Mombasa, says the centre was created through private /public partnership between Ministry of Health and International Centre for Reproductive Health to provide 24 hour care for survivors of sexual gender based violence. Further Information: