Multi-sectoral approach to help fight violence in sports

The team appointed to champion the fight against Gender-Based Violence in sports will use a multi-sectoral approach to combat the vice, signalling a united front in addressing the problem.

Sports Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen presided over the launch of both the organising committee, and the secretariat of the Gender Protection and Implementation Committee in Nairobi.

The organising committee and the secretariat are tasked with the responsibility of making Kenya a safe haven for athletes.

Speaking during the launch yesterda, Murkomen urged the members “not to let the country down”.

The launch of the two teams coincided with the start of this year’s 16 Days of Activism against GBV.

The Organising Committee is made up of seven individuals, among them athletes and experts. Kenya’s distance running legend, Catherine Ndereba, Harambee Starlets player Essie Akida, and Prof Paul Ochieng are part of the committee.

Lawyer Diana Watila will serve as chief executive officer of the five-member Secretariat. Murkomen and Sports Principal Secretary Peter Tum will sit on the Advisory Board.

While observing that GBV cuts across the community, and that most Kenyan athletes come from conservative backgrounds where a woman’s worth is tied to her perceived virtue, Watila said the committee will collaborate with all sectors, including the judiciary, police, and the media, in doing its work.

The former Head of Complaints Management at the Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA) said his team will seek to empower athletes through training and mentorship programmes, and will strive to provide legal aid and streamline the process for reporting abuse.

Wetila said they will also advocate for legal reforms to ensure the sports persons are comprehensively protected.

“We want to focus on the ability to educate them (athletes), give them legal aid and mentorship,” Watila said on the sideline of the launch at Talanta Plaza in Nairobi.

“We will deal with the issue of psycho-social support, and complaints management mechanism and make it possible for people to whistle blow toll-free. We want to be able to hear whenever athletes are being told to exchange sex for an opportunity,” the former Deputy Executive Director at the Federation of Women’s Lawyers in Kenya (FIDA-Kenya) said.

“We also have our junior teams, so we want to pick up on the issues of safeguarding officers, how do we expand it in terms of investigations, how do we work well with police on the same.”

Lately, cases of GBV among athletes in Kenya have been on the rise, with some losing their lives.

On September 5, Ugandan marathoner Rebecca Cheptegei died at the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital in Eldoret where she had been rushed for treatment after her boyfriend doused her in petrol.

She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed in Kenya in the past three years.

The others are award-winning runner Agnes Tirop who was stabbed to death by her boyfriend in 2021, Edith Kimani, who was murdered at her house in Nyeri in 2021, and Kenyan-born Bahraini Damaris Mutua who was found strangled in her house in Iten in 2022. According to a Kenya Gazette notice dated November 22, 2024, which announced the establishment of the Organising Committee and Secretariat for Gender Protection and Implementation Committee, their key mandate is to ensure full implementation of the report on gender welfare and equity in sports submitted by the taskforce on Gender Welfare in Sports on January 19, 2022. The taskforce on Gender Welfare in Sports, chaired by Ndereba, was established by the Ministry of Sports in July 2021 following the rise in cases of GBV among athletes.

Yesterday, Murkomen said that the report which was dubbed Levelling the Playing: Gender Inclusivity in Sports, revealed that 57 per cent of sports persons interviewed admitted to having been subjected to sexual abuse more than 10 times. “Such profanity paints a grim picture of a talent-rich sports sector that’s choking in the cesspool of discrimination, harassment, and violence,” said the CS.

“In such cases, teams are selected not based on who is best prepared for the competition but what they can offer. The ripple effect of this is poor team selection which then results in poor performance in competitions,” he added.

The CS called on the courts to take judicial notice and expedite cases where athletes are fighting to reclaim to recover their wealth from partners or managers who exploited them.

“If it is rather obvious that this one was a coach or pretending to be a manager and now the lady cannot access money or her wealth because somebody now thinks they must co-own that money, the principle of contribution is not enough. The court must take judicial notice of the circumstances that this lady is operating and either expedite the cases or allow them to access their money,” he said Murkomen.

On their part, Sports Principal Secretary Peter Tum and Sports, Arts and Social Development Fund CEO Nuh Ibrahim promised full support to the Organising Committee and Secretariat for Gender Protection and Implementation Committee.

The members will serve for three years.