Day of Families: A young mother struggles to support household
A mother and her daughter. It is tough raising a family as a single parent.
What you need to know:
- Mama Joy, a teenage mother abandoned by partner, now struggles alone to raise her child amid economic hardship.
- Forced into motherhood by deception, she represents Kenya’s overlooked single-parent families left unsupported by national family protection policies.
Mama Joy (identified by her daughter's name as preferred) became a mother against her wishes. While in Class Seven at a day primary school in Busia County, she had a boyfriend older than her and already out of school. He had completed Form Four and worked as a labourer. He impregnated her on the pretext of love and marriage promise.
“But when I told him, he ran away like a madman, saying I was wicked,” recalls the 23-year-old, her voice heavy with emotion.
She still sees him around the village. He avoids her like she was a stinging nettle, yet he often sees her with their now four-year-old daughter. Following the pregnancy, she dropped out of school and never re-enrolled. Her parents told her to “carry your own burdens just as you brought them”.
Now, she struggles to find work in the village. “I got a job as a cook and waitress at a local hotel, but you’d work for a week and be paid only Sh200. I felt that was exploitation... so I quit. If I get farm work, I do it; if there’s laundry or cleaning, I take it up. I do whatever I can provide for my daughter,” she says.
Mama Joy is not only a victim of sexual exploitation and teenage pregnancy; she is now one of the growing number of single-parent households in Kenya. Her family is recognised in the National Policy on Family Promotion and Protection, launched last year by the Ministry of Social Protection on May 15 during the celebration of the International Day of Families.
Although, the government recognises in the policy that over the years, single-parent families have been on the rise because of imprisonment, migration, death, abandonment, divorce, or separation, it fails to include the factor of those arising from teenage pregnancy or sexual exploitation.
This year, the world marks the day under the theme: ‘Family-Oriented Policies for Sustainable Development: Towards the Second World Summit for Social Development.’
In the policy document, then Cabinet Secretary for Social Protection Florence Bore, stated that the government had committed to providing services and protection to families, while creating a favourable environment for the enjoyment of their freedoms, liberties, and the pursuit of happiness.
Specific strategies target single parents like Mama Joy, including the implementation of family well-being programmes, service facilities, and infrastructure tailored to single-parent households. Among the government’s plans to promote and protect vulnerable families is the proposed budget of Sh100 million – the initiation of empowerment programmes for widows, widowers, and the boychild alongside the girlchild.
Other strategies include prioritising vulnerable members of society in the Affordable Housing Programme, and promoting the establishment of rescue centres and shelters for survivors of abuse and violence.
“What I urgently need right now is a job or money to start a business. Raising a child alone is depressing,” she says.
