The price of protection: Kenya's GBV shelters at breaking point

From beds that could house vulnerable teenage mothers sitting empty in one of the few shelters in Nyeri because of insufficient funds; to facing gun shots while attempting to rescue a mother and her children from an abusive husband in Nakuru, shelter operators say they are often struggling on their own, in the absence of government regulation and support. 

“We are dealing with a public problem with private solutions,” said Wangechi Wachira, the executive director of the Centre for Rights Education and Awareness (Creaw) – a national women’s rights organisation – during the second National Shelters Network Conference.

She and others want to see government funding and regulatory oversight for the sector. Currently, there are no shelter-specific regulations that standardise the establishment and management of gender-based violence (GBV) protection centres in Kenya. 

Read: Take issue of shelters, safe houses for abuse victims more seriously

The conference comes as Kenya is in the midst of skyrocketing femicide and GBV cases, with some like Nakuru Governor Susan Kihika, calling for the ongoing violence to be declared a national disaster. Advocates call shelters “the missing link” in combating GBV, but despite several commitments over the years, the government has yet to pass a policy regulating the sector and giving legal standing to shelters. Operators say this leaves them struggling in grey areas with no financial support or security. They want that to change. 

“We don’t have clear regulations regarding running shelters in Kenya,” acknowledged Dr Josephine Obonyo, the gender secretary at the State Department for Gender and Affirmative Action (SDfGAA).

In November 2023, President William Ruto mandated the SDfGAA through an executive order to create those regulatory structures, ensuring that functional protection centres exist in every county. That order, says Josephine, is part of the reason SDfGAA started working with the National Shelters Network (NSN), which represents 84 shelters across 19 counties, eight months ago.

“So much progress has been made,” she said, adding there is now a “clear road map” and completed draft concept, which sector stakeholders collaborated on. “We have a target of March 2025 to come up with a policy.”

Read: State to establish safe houses for troubled Kenyans in Middle East

When asked if enough progress has been made since the inaugural National Shelters Network Conference, two-and-a-half years ago – when centre operators and civil society organisations made the same appeal for state funding and regulations – Josephine noted that her department was not formally working with the NSN at the time. 

“I would like to state clearly that this is the first conference where we've engaged as partners,” she said. 

Slow progress towards policy

The state has been “very slow” at creating policies and frameworks, said Edith Murogo, the executive director of the Centre for Domestic Training and Development, which, along with the state department, organised this year’s conference. But, she said, the executive order and current partnership with the SDfGAA make her optimistic. “We are working together and looking at the solutions together, taking the steps together, planning together,” Edith said. 

The government, she said, now recognises privately operated shelters and is aware of the challenges they face – such as the inability to register centres appropriately, forcing centres to seek other registrations “just so that they have some legal existence”.

“Shelters have been there for quite some time in Kenya, without even the state knowing about the existence of these shelters or even the way they work and how they work,” Edith said.

As for the requested formal state policy addressing those challenges? 

Read: State should create a database of GBV safe houses

“There's no progress on the policy. No progress, completely,” Edith said. 

Currently, a taskforce is evaluating existing laws to see where a shelter-specific law can be anchored, she said. “You don't want to create laws if you already have existing laws that can cover the issue of shelters.” 

Numerous acts and policies interact with the work of GBV protection centres, including the Sexual Offences Act (2006), the Protection Against Domestic Violence Act (2015) and the Children’s Act (2011), but centre operators say the lack of shelter-specific regulations often create risks and hurdles for them.

GBV centres caught in regulatory gaps 

Nkatha Mugao, director for Frolics of Hope Africa, which operates a hotline and rescue shelters for children and women facing violence, experienced those risks first hand. 

“Personally, I’ve been shot at,” Nkatha said.

The incident happened while she was attempting to rescue a mother and her children from an abusive husband, who was a government official, in Nakuru, she said. “When he heard us knocking, he didn't even open the door, he just started shooting.”

As there is no option to register Frolics of Hope properly, Nkatha said they are forced to do rescue work as private citizens. She’s had to hire former military personnel to help. Frolics of Hope is registered as a community-based organisation, NGO and a company limited. The Constitution outlines its centres are shelters, but the registration certificate itself doesn’t have the word shelter, Nkatha said.

“It leaves a big leeway for harassment, for shelter managers,” she said. “If a chief doesn't like me, then they have a leeway of going to the police and saying this person has been trafficking children and you can't go to court and defend yourself otherwise.” 

She wants legal standing for GBV protection centres. “What exactly is the government telling us as shelters, in terms of protecting us, because we are kind of left hanging in the balance?” Nkatha said. 

Number of shelters in Kenya disputed

Former president Uhuru Kenyatta made an international commitment in Paris, France, during the 2021 Generation Equality Forum for Kenya to establish GBV recovery centres and shelters in all 47 counties. 

A byproduct of shelters being unable to register consistently are disputed numbers for how many exist in Kenya and where. The NSN represents 84 shelters spread over only 19 counties, leaving 28 counties without a GBV protection centre. The state department disputes that figure. 

No county does not have a shelter, Josephine said. “It's only that they come in different shapes and sizes,” she said, pointing to the sector's lack of regulation and uniform definition for what constitutes a shelter. 

The state department would classify several conference attendees as children’s shelters, she said. When both privately and publicly operated children’s homes are included, all 47 counties have a shelter, she added. 

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Elizabeth Muriuki, co-founder and executive director of Serene Haven, a rescue centre for young women and teenage mothers in Nyeri, said shelters such as hers are often mistaken for children’s homes. 

“Yet we are not a children’s home,” said Elizabeth, adding she gets mothers ranging in age from 13–24 with their children. “I have adults and children, all of them are survivors of gender-based violence.” 

The need in Nyeri is greater than the available resources, says Elizabeth. She has to refer cases of mothers over 24 to shelters in different counties, which are often full. 

Despite Serene Haven being one of the few shelters in Nyeri, Elizabeth said she currently isn’t able to operate at full capacity because she does not have the money to feed more people. “I only have 14 clients. Yet I have space for like 30,” she said. “Sometimes I’m called and I have to turn down cases and tell them, ‘no, we don’t have space.’ But the beds are staring at me, empty.”