Rising above GBV: Stories of resilience and hope in Kilifi County
SGBV survivors Nancy Musami and Salome Bahati with some of the food items on November 11, 2024.
What you need to know:
- Salome Bahati is now a budding businesswoman on the outskirts of Kilifi town, owning a restaurant that also offers outside catering services.
- Nancy Musami runs a charcoal business and has a small eatery, where she sells chapati, beans and chips, besides making and selling soap.
Salome Bahati from Magarini, Kilifi County, was only 16 when she suffered sexual and gender-based violence.
At the time, she was still in primary school but was forced to drop shortly after to look after her mother who fell ill. When Nation.Africa catches up with her on the outskirts of Kilifi town this sunny hot afternoon, Salome says her woes started when her mother walked away from a polygamous marriage.
Salome followed her mother who soon fell ill, forcing her to shoulder the burden of taking care of the mother. She got a job as a domestic worker in Malindi to help foot the mother’s medical bills and other expenses. It is while here that he met a man who offered the help she badly needed. Unbeknown to her, the man had other intentions.
“The man gave us a place where we would keep our sick mum. There is no other way I would have paid him as I did not have the money, so I had to sleep with him. I was still a minor and did not know that it amounted to sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV). I just wanted my mother to get well,” she says.
Her encounter with the man, she says, would lead to her getting pregnant and later giving birth to a boy. She regrets what happened. More than 10 years later, Salome has decided to rise above GBV and take charge of her life. She is now a budding businesswoman on the outskirts of Kilifi town, owning a restaurant that also offers outside catering services.
Salome Bahati prepares ingredients at her restaurant on the outskirts of Kilifi town on November 11, 2024. Salome is a survivor of gender-based violence who has risen to embrace entrepreneurship. She operates a restaurant and an outside catering business.
“I offer catering services for corporate events, weddings, and dowry ceremonies. This year, business has been tough, but we are optimistic that the coming year will be better.”
On a bad day, Salome makes Sh300 and Sh600 on a good day from her food business, besides the outside catering gigs. The money has helped her to take care of herself and her son, including paying his school fees. A few years ago, she went back to school and sat her Kenya Certificate of Primary Education examination.
She has also enrolled for the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education exam as a private candidate. Now aged 29, she wants to be a lawyer and is determined to pursue her dream.
“Girls in the Mijikenda community are neglected when it comes to education. In my family, we were five girls and we were not educated. My father used to say that he would not educate girls and we would get married. That’s why I am determined to educate myself. I believe that my dream is still valid.”
Salome is a beneficiary of the Wajibika na Unawiri project, which seeks to unite diverse stakeholders and intensify efforts to end violence against women and girls in Kilifi County.
Through this project, she says she has been trained in financial recording and learnt about marketing her catering services. Her wish is to have a hotel that offers coastal cuisine.
And to reduce SGBV, she calls on parents to be responsible. “If my father had allowed my mother to stay, I would not have been violated.”
The story is not different for Nancy Musami from Ganze. Even though the kind of abuse she suffered was not sexual, it took a toll on her emotionally and psychologically, she says. “I experienced emotional violence. My partner would always use abusive and demeaning words that were hurting,” Nancy says in an interview.
Nancy says the abusive language hurt her emotional wellbeing. “I sank into depression. That affected me so much. I had to undergo counselling to heal. I am glad I'm now fine.”
The mother of one has picked up the pieces and now owns a thriving business in Marembo village, Kilifi North. She runs a charcoal business and has a small eatery, where she sells chapati, beans and chips. She also makes and sells soap, having trained under the Wajibika na Unawiri project.
On a good day, Nancy makes at least Sh500, money that helps her cater to her expenses, including rent, food and family needs. Nancy is currently undertaking a diploma in counselling psychology, a course that will be instrumental in helping her empower GBV survivors.
She is also a volunteer community counsellor and a gender champion working with the Centre for Rights Education and Awareness (Creaw). To end SGBV, Nancy says there is a need for all stakeholders to work together. “We need to mount a serious awareness campaign on GBV at the grassroots level where cases are rampant. We also need to offer psychological support to survivors.”
Kilifi is one of the counties with high cases of SGBV cases. According to the 2022 Kenya Demographic and Health Survey (KDHS), 20 per cent of girls and women aged 15–49 had experienced physical violence from the age of 15. The KDHS report also indicates that eight per cent of women aged 15–49 had experienced physical violence in the 12 months preceding the survey.
It also shows that 12 per cent of women aged 15–49 had experienced sexual violence, adding that seven per cent of women in the same age group had experienced sexual violence in the 12 months prior to the survey.
The report indicates 30 per cent of women aged 15–49 who had ever been married or had an intimate partner had experienced physical, sexual, or psychological violence at the hands of their most recent partner or husband.
The Wajibika na Unawiri project is part of this year’s UNiTE campaign in commemoration of the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. It is being funded by the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation, supported by UN Women and implemented by Creaw.
Pauline Muigai from Creaw notes that they train community champions in using social accountability action, equip them with tools to mobilise and sensitise their communities to GBV prevention and response, and promote positive cultural and behavioural changes.
“We are enhancing the capacity of GBV survivors and service providers in shelters to provide safe, confidential, and survivor-centred services that focus on healing and empowerment.”
UN Women Country Representative Antonia Ngabala-Sodonon notes that ending GBV requires a multifaceted approach. “The 16 Days of Activism campaign underscores the urgent need to tackle gender-based violence through solutions that reflect the realities of local communities, supported by strong and strategic partnerships that aim at preventing and responding to violence against women and girls,” she tells Nation.Africa.
She adds that through funding from the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation and collaboration with local leaders, systems that support survivors and address the causes of violence are being built.
Geovanni Grandi, the Head Italian Agency for Development Cooperation Nairobi Office, says the organisation is committed to ending GBV through strategic partnerships and initiatives such as the 'Let It Not Happen Again' project, which aims at strengthening legal frameworks, improving access to justice, and empowering survivors.
The project, he adds, has highlighted the importance of community-driven efforts to amplify survivors’ voices and promote lasting change. Some of the factors contributing to high SGBV prevalence in Kilifi are cultural norms and poverty, besides lack of shelter services for victims.
To tame SGBV, Kilifi last year enacted the SGBV Act. Mwangome Shumaa, the county director of gender and youth, says the new law will raise awareness, prevent, and respond to SGBV. “With the SGBV Act in place, the county is now set to launch an anti-GBV policy to support the fight against GBV. The policy will support implementation of the Act.”
Mwangome notes that GBV is a major setback against achieving gender equality, adding the county is keen to empower girls and women as a strategy to end GBV.
