We are ready to pay tax, say sex workers

Commercial Sex Workers demonstrate to protest harassment by authorities and call for protection of their human rights in Nairobi March 6, 2012. The workers said they were ready to remit taxes to the government as long as they are recognised and their rights protected. JAYNE NGARI

By AGGREY MUTAMBO amutambo@ke.nationmedia.com
Posted  Tuesday, March 6  2012 at  16:38

Sex workers have said they are ready to remit taxes to the government as long as they are recognised and their rights protected.

The Kenya Sex Workers Alliance (KESWA) Tuesday argued that they are in an “industry that controls massive revenue” which would otherwise contribute to the economy of the country if tapped by the taxman.

“There is a lot of revenue in the industry and we are ready to pay our taxes if the government decriminalises sex workers in this country,” said Doughtie Ogutu, one of the KESWA founders.

Their position came just weeks after Nairobi Mayor George Aladwa formed a committee to check whether prostitution should be legalised in the city.

The committee, led by assistant town clerk in charge of reforms Daniel Masetu was mandated to analyse city by-laws that make prostitution illegal and advise the mayor. However, until then, Mr Aladwa said frequent crackdowns on prostitution would continue.

The sex workers claimed they were in it by choice because they are adults and no one should condemn them but recognise them as a way of fighting HIV and Aids.

“Who says that people should judge others? Who knows what people do behind doors? There’s only one being who should judge us and that is God. If we have sinned, it is Him who should say so,” said John Mathenge, the KESWA Coordinator.

The Ministry of Health estimates that at least 30 per cent of HIV patients are sex workers or those who bought sex from them. The National Aids Control Unit indicates that another 15 per cent of new infections occur among prostitutes.

It’s not clear how many sex workers there are in Kenya, but the Unit shows that there are 7,000 commercial sex workers in Nairobi alone. KESWA claimed it had 40,000 followers.

On Tuesday, they held a demonstration in Nairobi to mark the World Sex Workers’ Day where they argued that they have been subjected to discrimination despite the country passing new laws for equality.

Prostitution for material gain may be outlawed under the Penal Code although the punishment meted to men is different from that given to women.

Under section 153 and 154, a man found to gain from prostitution “in any public place” is charged with misdemeanour, an offence liable for any term of sentence or corporal punishment on being found guilty for the second time. The woman on the other hand would be charged with felony.

They wore face masks and carried banners some reading “My body, my business”, “My body, my choice” and “show us the money for our health.”

“Sex workers are violated every day, but they are not able to access health and legal services because of discrimination.

“A lot of times some us are raped, but no one would believe or help us get treated,” argued Ms Ogutu.

While they acknowledged prostitution is illegal, they said they are ready to compromise with the government on how they should work within the available laws.

http://www.nation.co.ke/News/We+are+ready+to+pay+tax++say+sex+workers/-/1056/1360534/-/item/1/-/pwau5dz/-/index.html

Prostitution is unAfrican? You must be joking…

By TEE NGUGI

Comments attributed to Nairobi Mayor George Aladwa on plans to legalise prostitution in the city have elicited horror from a cross-section of society. The various reactions are well represented by Nairobi Metropolitan Development Minister Njeru Githae’s view on the subject. Wearing the pious face of the faithful, Mr Githae denounced prostitution as immoral, unlawful and unAfrican.

 These terms, unleashed with self-righteous indignation at various points in our post-colonial national conversation, do not, in and of themselves, possess the eternal self-evident meaning their users presuppose. Their meaning is, in fact, dependent on the vagaries of social development and shifting power relations.

Take the idea of morality, for instance. The morality of Victorian England, in which the slightest hint of sexuality was frowned upon, was different from more permissive eras before and after. And in many traditional African societies, it was normal for women to go bare-chested, a practice that would today offend public morality in most African urban areas, at least.

In other words, a society’s sense of what is moral or immoral is a product of its worldview, which in turn is a function of social change.

If there should be any doubt about the political nature of law, Kenyans need only look at the number of laws that are being made obsolete by the new Constitution. The sedition law, for instance. During the Kanu dictatorship, scores of Kenyans were jailed after “due” process in courts of law on charges of sedition, which usually meant being suspected of holding views contrary to those of the president and the ruling party.

In the Jim Crow era in the USA, there were so-called miscegenation laws that, if not overtaken by political and social change, would have put many Americans in jail, including President Barack Obama’s parents. What is lawful and what is not is subject to political process.

The epithet “unAfrican” is a psychological weapon employed by traditional or modern elites to achieve conformity of thought or entrench privilege. It can be used in any number of situations.

African women drivers were, at some point, stigmatised as unAfrican, as if African males driving were a much revered practice in traditional society. And it was not long ago that democracy and human rights were dismissed as unAfrican by Africa’s autocrats.

Hypocrisy

African intellectuals too have found much use for the label, often ridiculing those who criticise their cultural nationalist theories as unAfrican, a practice that, at its most absurd, chastised as cultural traitors Africans learning ballet, classical music, opera or even playing rugby and golf.

But I suspect that most of us in the privacy of our thoughts know that the fulminations against prostitution are a cover for a deep hypocrisy. This hypocrisy is sustained by a myth propagated by ourselves but which fools no one else.

Kenyan writer Wangui wa Goro, talking in another context, says: “ I think there is a myth, an idea that people in Africa don’t enjoy love, don’t enjoy sex, that it is not physical and that it is not emotional…” Thus we refused to publicly discuss Aids and sex in the 1980s and early 90s until threat of extinction forced us to debate the subject and come up with remedying policies.

Prostitution is a reality that we all know exists among us, but which, to assuage our misplaced moral sensibilities, we pretend does not exist. After all, we lie to ourselves, it is not African, it is immoral, our laws forbid it! It is a lie we hold on to even when, as happened a few years ago, a police swoop on Koinange Street nets MPs and Cabinet ministers.

Research over the years has shown that limited legalisation of prostitution would have a number of benefits. Sex workers could be accorded better STD prevention and treatment services.

The trade would be confined to certain areas instead of being conducted all over the city. Legalising it would also protect the sex workers from abuse and exploitation.

The oldest trade in the world is here to stay. Confronting reality as opposed to hiding from it is key to any society’s survival. As we know from our experience with Aids, the sooner we come to this realisation the better.

Tee Ngugi is a social and political commentator based in Nairobi

http://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/OpEd/comment/Prostitution+is+unAfrican+You+must+be+joking/-/434750/1324608/-/item/1/-/iprrc4z/-/index.html

Kenyan Call Girls Exporting Sex ToJuba

 

Tuesday, 10 January 2012 00:20 BY JOYCE JOAN WANGU

Juba, the capital of the world’s newest country, South Sudan is earning accolades by the day. Since the historic secession from the North mid last year, Juba has seen a surge in trade and a massive construction of new structures, as it scrambles for recognition in the global map. The city has attracted people from all over the world including humanitarian workers, consulates, traders and those in hospitality industry. The new economic euphoria, coupled by an unprecedented cross border immigration is now flourishing the world’s oldest profession-prostitution.

Commercial sex workers are drawn from neighboring countries including Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea and the DRC. They are thronging Juba for one mission- to make quick money. Even the previously naive South Sudanese and several Northerners (young girls and women) have been lured into the trade in a bid to earn a living and sexual freedom.

In a bid to revamp a country reeling from a protracted 21 year old civil war, it is a catch 22 scenario for foreign traders who want to export anything that can be sold in Juba-including sex. The upsurge in sex trade, mainly booming along the border areas and in the main city has necessitated the influx of brothels, mainly operating as sex camps. Among the brothels that have made house hold names include, Gumbo, Rock City, Jebel, Customs and Airport road among others, all located within Juba town. Kenyans known to be entrepreneurial by nature are flexing their muscles in the lucrative business. Rock City Lodge is home to about 200 and 400 Kenyan sex workers, according to statistics by a Juba-based NGO, Confident Children out of Conflict, who mainly target travelers and tourists.

Although prostitution is illegal in South Sudan, many girls engage in the trade in hide-outs masquerading as lodges. An official from the South Sudan Aids Commission who begged anonymity admits that containing the vice is an uphill task because it has also lured under-age South Sudanese girls sell their bodies for a living.

“Prior to the stability of South Sudan and the signing of the CPA in 2005, prostitution was largely associated with foreigners. It is regrettable that our very own girls now engage in transactional sex work due to the influence from their foreign peers.” He cites poverty and lack of education as the major contributors to commercial sex. “You see, most of these local girls are homeless and without any family, and since they can’t get descent jobs, they resort to prostitution.”

Foreign girls turning tricks are increasing in number. Statistics from a US-funded organisation, Family Health International puts the number of sex workers to between 4000 and 10000, which is also inclusive of locals.

A section of Kenyan girls living in Juba engage in transactional sex voluntarily while scores of others are lured into the trade by unscrupulous agents operating in Nairobi, who organise for the girls to go and work as domestic workers or as waitresses, only to end up as prostitutes. Once they enter Juba, the latter are now dependent on their ‘hosts’ who mainly operate as pimps. Janet Kanini 25 has just returned from Juba. She was invited there by her aunt (name withheld) in January last year, immediately after the historic referendum to call for a secession of the South from the North.

“I thought that I was going to help my aunt in her restaurant situated at the Jebel market. She had linked me up with an agency in Nairobi’s river road area who helped me with a passport and visa as well as other logistics to enable me travel to Juba.” The young girl, who allows me to use her real names but not photograph her, says upon reaching Juba, she only worked at her aunt’s restaurant for one week. She would later be enrolled in a brothel to work as a prostitute.

“I could service five male clients in a night. They never paid me anything as the money went to the brothel owner who I referred to as ‘mum’. Janet talks of the sexual violence that surrounds the brothels. “The clients do not care if you are there voluntarily or otherwise. Some even insult you while others beat you up.” She says that the issue of protection is a mirage as some clients refuse to wear condoms. “Sometimes when you tell a man to use a condom, he points a gun at you. Then after finishing with you, he will mock you and leave the room, ready to ‘slaughter’ another girl,” she says.

Janet’s case represents scores of girls who are not in a position to negotiate their sex work, or even to benefit from the money they have been earning. Hers is a classic example of involuntary bonded labour. An action research carried out by a Juba-based NGO, Confident Children out of Conflict (CCC) notes that ‘Pimps are the business brokers or -managers of prostitutes. Usually the prostitutes are highly dependent on them for their protection. Financially, they are usually dependent on them too, even to the extent of bondage. They manage the flow of clients to the sex workers and recover a large part of their earnings as rent in return.’

Like any other trade, sex business is booming in Juba. Most Kenyan girls that iI interviewed admit that Sudanese men are the ‘new kids on the block’ as they have lots of cash. “I target tall Dinka men who drive cars with number plates written GOSS (Government of South Sudan),” says Triza* proudly. Triza is a fresh graduate of Nairobi University who had been a commercial sex worker at the famous Koinange ‘Red light’ street in Nairobi.

She decided to export her skills into Juba because, according to her, Nairobi is not lucrative any more. “There are so many of us at Koinange street and with the harsh economic times in Nairobi, people are wary of spending on sex.” In Juba, she can make a whooping 1,335.77 SDG ($500) in a week and this she does by sleeping with different men at different lodges. Triza’s clients include rich Dinka men, expatratiates but on a grey day, she can offer her services to truck drivers who pay her a paltry 20SDG per sex round.

Juba’s sexual landscape is a far cry from Nairobi’s Koinange street. Whereas Nairobi girls are known for positioning themselves at noticeable pick-up points along the road, or operating in palatial homes in leafy suburbs, in Juba, the sex business is mainly in dilapidated sex camps. I visited the Gumbo Business Centre, which also serves as a transit area for many trucks that deliver goods into Juba thus making it strategic for many travelers in need of lodging.

Gumbo is lined up with numerous brothels masquerading as lodges. These are skewed structures mainly constructed with tin and papyrus and the numerous rows and rows of them have given birth to a sprawling slum. Never mind the dilapidated set up of the place, with open sewers full of filth and rotten garbage, for this is where money changes hands for female bodies. In here, the business of sex is under the strict guidance of pimps (brothel owners) thus making it less lucrative for the girls. It is here that you also find under age Southern Sudanese who cannot afford to solicit for sex in Hadikas (night clubs).

“On a good week, I can pocket around (500 SDG) $187 and that is if I solicit sex from one sex camp to another,” says Kate* a Kenyan. Kate earns 20 SDG per sex session and can reduce it to 10, on a rainy day. According to her many Kenyan girls, unlike their foreign counterparts, always agree to use condoms unless when they are under intense pressure from violent clients. “We always get condoms from local NGO’s like International HIV/Aids Alliance and our peer educators implore on us to always use them. Sometimes when you tell a client to wear protection, he threatens you with a knife or refuses to pay you.” She has since gone for five HIV tests which proved negative. But this status could be short-lived.

Kate lives a double life. During the day, she works in a salon and at night, she is a ‘call’ girl. She has so mastered the art that she is able to spot a man with a rich pocket. “You know here in Juba, so many wealthy people are coming for business and after a hard day, they need some quality time,” she says with a smile. Kate decries the deplorable life of the sex camps where exploitation is rife.

She says that lodge owners capitalize on the trade at the expense of the girls, “We do the donkey work but get peanuts. If I rely on the sex camps I will be so poor, so I have to up my game by soliciting for men in night clubs and sometimes at the border.” She however admits that the influx of twilight girls in Juba has reduced their earnings.

“I came here five years ago and that time, we were so few. A single sex act could earn me at least 30pounds ($11). I could operate from Jebel and Konyokonyo markets. (Jebel is the largest market in Juba which is synonymous with sex workers, while the latter has traders of all sorts and also specialisez in sex trade). She says that Kenyans have to compete for clients with Ethiopian and Ugandan girls, who flock the markets and are also very ‘smart’ in the game. Sometimes when business is really low, they are forced to share clients and consequently share the pay.

These sex rooms have nothing to show for it, save for the ‘work’ that goes on here. The beds are made of bamboo sticks, often very weak and lack bedsheets. Ventilation is a mirage and floors are mainly mud or sand. The bathroom area needs a facelift, it reeks of stale urine and the taps are ever dry. The girls have to rely on the brothel owners to provide water for bathing. One has to part with at least $3-5 for daily rent in which case is the amount one makes on the job. Most girls however, opt for monthly rent which could go for $50 or less, if one negotiates with the brothel owners.

“Here is it very hard to get well-to-do clients because of the deplorable condition of the area, but all the same we make it,” says a disgruntled Mary*, also a Kenyan. At 35, the mother of three is not ready to quit yet. All her children were born on ‘the job’ and there is a probability that they might end up like her. She talks of a great moral decadence at the brothels, thus making it not safe for growing children. Her main clients are truck drivers who often book nearby lodges for sleep. She says that some drivers are so stingy with money and opt to exchange sex for food. “A client can sleep with you and instead of giving you money, he will buy you food.” These are mainly Mundukuru( Arabic shop owners).

Though Gumbo is mainly associated with Ugandan sex workers, Kenyan girls are gaining popularity by the day. Most sex camps here are owned by soldiers and police men who often run the place in ‘absentia’ but the sex workers admit that the same policemen solicit sex from them, ‘at a very bad fee’. One Ugandan girl told me that the police pretend to do raids at night in a bid to stop the vice, only to end up sleeping with the girls, “Banange, are you asking me about police raids, hahaha, we are not scared of them anymore.”

Most Kenyan restaurant proprietors organize for sex clients for the call girls. Once the clients dine in their restaurants, they are referred to the brothels where eager girls are waiting for them. The girls will later split the pay with the restaurant owner.

Ironically, even the areas surrounding the renowned Dr. John Garang Mausoleaum and the Juba University roundabouts are prone to sex workers. The International HIV & Aids Alliance, an NGO supporting community action on Aids in developing countries, which has a presence in South Sudan, estimates the HIV prevalence rate to be 6% in Juba. The influx of foreigners who influence young South Sudanese into prostitution could push the figure further.

Now, with the alarming HIV prevalence rate, Local authorities in Juba, under the directive of the South Sudan goverment is set to dismantle all city brothels and deport foreign prostitutes who they blame for decaying the morals of South Sudanese. If this happens, foreign sex workers, including Kenyans may have to find alternative ways of earning a living.

http://www.the-star.co.ke/lifestyle/128-lifestyle/57316-kenyan-call-girls-exporting-sex-to juba

The Role of Performing arts in Countering human trafficking

Article by Bernard Muhia the Director of Fern Poems

The Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Mr. Antonio Maria Costa says that art is one of the most powerful advocacy tools to raise awareness and move people to take action. Whereas lectures and books are good in their respect, they are no match for the power of music, drama or poetry in disseminating crucial messages on human trafficking. The fact that art is often entertaining at its very core means that there is an extended attention span associated with it and an improved capacity to remember the message contained therein.

This brings me to my second point. Performance arts are most effective when the audience participates in the dissemination of the message. This is the reason why there are practicals in schools so that the students can learn by doing. This drastically increases their chances of deeply understanding and remembering what they have learnt. Therefore, art can be used as a means of providing a cultural and social voice where engagement by participants promotes their role as active and creative citizens.

Sanalimu Art Ensemble using percussion and narration to pass out counter trafficking message

Therefore, art can be used as a means of providing a cultural and social voice where engagement by participants promotes their role as active and creative citizens. This aspect of audience participation is a method we as Fern Poetry have used in our advocacy campaigns against human trafficking. Using poetry as our medium, we have been able to reach High School students who are in the most vulnerable age bracket for human trafficking. We have achieved this by reciting/reading poems for the students. The poems not only break down this issue into an understandable concept but they also use heavy imagery and empathy to appeal to the minds and hearts of the students thereby ensuring that the message truly gets home.

The Fern Poems educating students against human trafficking using poems

In an effort to ensure their participation in the process, we then ask the students to also write their own poems and essays on the topic of human trafficking as they understand it. I have some of these submissions with me and I hope to indulge you in sampling what the students have to say during the course of this symposium. As the students write their poems and essays, they sharpen their knowledge on the subject which further engraves the message in their minds and impresses upon them the need to also engage in creating further awareness on human trafficking to their peers and other networks.

Onyango from Kitale AIDS programme using humour to educate the public against human trafficking

In order to make the performance arts more effective in creating public awareness, always ensure that:

1. The performance arts campaign has a broad support system. Ideally, the more people working on the awareness campaign, the greater the likelihood that it will be successful. In our case, involving the students by asking them to create their own poems about human trafficking means that there is an actual two-way exchange and that the students themselves also become agents of awareness creation.
2. Secondly, ensure that there is room for all forms of art. Do not limit the performance to one form of art, say poetry, because you will have locked out other writers and singers as well as painters and sculptors. Even though the awareness campaign may have started with one form of art, make sure that it is open to all other forms of art.
3. Thirdly, always make sure that there is a concise and consistent message throughout the campaign. Cross-check your facts and where possible, give the audience reference materials that they can use as they co-create artwork meant to promote awareness on human trafficking. The last thing we need is misinformation.

Among the various forms of art that organizations can use in their counter human trafficking programs include music concerts, exhibitions of photos, paintings, drawings and carvings, plays and dramas, poetry recitals and readings as well as holding competitions on these art forms.

In addition to all these, performance arts can also be used as a healing tool to rehabilitate survivors of human trafficking and especially child victims. Art helps them to express things that they may not be able to articulate or are too embarrassed or afraid to talk about. Art can thus be a therapeutic medium in the recovery of survivors.

Media

With regard to media relations, performance arts are a unique proposition to present to the media. Advocacy is typically about seminars and community workshops and these are effective in their own right, but that’s how everybody does their advocacy. So as an organization, you need a unique angle that sets you apart from other advocacy campaigns. Performance arts can provide that ‘wow effect’ that the media looks for. Performance arts are not only entertaining but they are also educative. It’s like killing two birds with one stone.

Speaking from my experience as a journalist, art is always a softer alternative to hard-hitting news. My poem on human trafficking was featured on CNN International because of that very aspect. After covering all the major conferences and seminars on human trafficking, CNN wanted to highlight other unique strategies that stakeholders in counter human trafficking were using to make a difference. Poetry was my unique thing and it got me noticed. It was a fresh and new approach to the advocacy campaign. Art has a way of humanizing or emotionalizing a problem. Art is about exploring not just the facts about the problem but also the feelings and emotions of that problem as felt by those who face it. Art doesn’t just give you the statistics but it also gives you the emotionality of the victims. And finally, art doesn’t just appeal to your mind and intellect, it also moves your heart and soul.

When pitching your performance arts campaign to the media, always ensure that you use what I call the ‘laser approach’. Identify a specific programme, presenter and/or journalist that will identify with the subject you aim to create awareness on. For example, in my case with CNN, I specifically targeted a programme called ‘The Freedom Project’. The freedom project is a year-long series that CNN launched to address the issue of human trafficking. That’s what I mean by being specific.

Secondly, always find ways to insert your message in any context when talking to the media. Here’s an example, my colleague was invited to NTV for an interview about a poetry event we were organizing that wasn’t in any way related to the human trafficking project. The presenter asked him if we had thought about taking poetry to schools and he took that opportunity to explain our human trafficking project in detail. It may not have been the reason why he went there but he used the opportunity to highlight our project.

Thirdly, when sending information to the media about your project, make sure that it is short and to the point. Just a few lines to a paragraph are enough to get the journalist interested in your story. Then the next thing the journalist will do is follow-up. So if you have a website or blog put the link there or your phone contacts so that they are able to get in touch with you.

Also, don’t just try to be covered in the news, think also of being featured in the non-news programs. These non-news programs include talk shows, art programs, health programs, human rights programs and even business programs. These programs provide you with media exposure and it is usually targeted exposure because the people watching or listening to that program have an interest in the subject matter. Likewise, the journalists or presenters of these programs are also looking for organizations like yours and so it’s a win-win situation.

Rafiki Mwafrika, in their drama entitled Mambo. Drama is a powerful enactment of reality.

Lastly, don’t shy away from calling-in live or sending text messages to a radio show or T.V. program. The host or presenter might sample your text message as part of the audience response and read it on air or they might receive your call and thus you get an opportunity to speak about your organization and your performance arts program. By so doing, you have just earned your organization and your arts campaign some impromptu media exposure.

In conclusion, the role of performing arts cannot be understated. It is organizations that are especially in the advocacy business that need to appreciate that there is always room for the arts in any awareness campaign. Art brings people together in a relaxed environment where they are able to more easily absorb the message when it is delivered in a light-hearted manner.

The youth are also very appreciative of the arts, and the fact that they are the most vulnerable population to human trafficking, means that art is then the most appropriate medium to use when creating awareness among them.

Long live the arts!

Pornography contributes to worsening weird sex practices

A 2009 Post in Nairobi Chronicle

The emergence of pornography in Kenya is contributing to sexual perversion as witnessed in the arrest of a paedophile in Nairobi last weekend. The 30 year old man was found with a vast collection of sex video tapes, DVDs, magazines and photographs.

The description given of the man’s lifestyle shows classic symptoms of a porn addict. He couldn’t stop himself from collecting explicit material at every chance. He continually hired prostitutes to satisfy his sexual cravings but when he got bored of it, he turned to his neighbours’ children.

So depraved was this young man that he roamed the streets with a camera photographing women. Later on, from the dingy comfort of his slum abode, he got kicks just looking at the photos. However, this case came to light because the accused basically gave himself up by printing the photos in a city centre studio. The staff, shocked by the images, called police.

There are scores of individuals addicted to pornography and subjecting themselves and their families to untold suffering. Cases of HIV/Aids, STDs, incest, child abuse, homosexuality and bestiality are increasing thanks to images supplied mostly from the internet.

At least 60% of the internet consists of “adult entertainment,” a polite term for pornography.  Unfortunately, Kenyan entrepreneurs are doing roaring business supplying sexually explicit stuff for just a couple of hundred shillings. Today, there is a booming industry in locally produced pornography which has not only enmeshed commercial sex workers but has trapped scores of unemployed youths eager for a quick shilling. Posters advertising the videos are pasted all over the city.

Once you agree to participate in a pornographic video, you can be forced to do anything. As audiences get bored watching “normal sex,” film producers must come up with bizarre sex acts that will stimulate their market and increase sales. This inevitably involves creating videos of group sexual orgies, homosexuality, lesbianism, sex with children and sex with animals.

In the Western world, the pornographic market is so accustomed to weird sex that porn producers are showing real life scenes of rape, torture and death. Some of the stuff coming out of western studios is too sickening to be described in a decent forum such as this one. The question is: Will the Kenyan pornographic industry head the same direction?

The growing number of strip clubs is certainly not helping the situation. As competition among entertainment joints intensifies, club owners feel pressured to have naked women dancing on table tops. In Nairobi city alone, there are at least a dozen strip clubs that advertise openly. It is said that a famous entertainment club in the eastern part of Nairobi offers rooms for Shs600 (US$7.8) for those who want to have sex with its strippers.

Pornography and strip clubs make people want to try out things that are best left in fantasy land. Pornography creates a false idea of sex especially in the minds of impressionable young people.

The liberalized world of today means that 10 year olds are already exposed to sex images through the media. Sex is a gift to humanity meant to strengthen the bonds between an adult couple consisting of man and woman and who are either married or intend to marry. The natural by-product of sex is pregnancy and the rearing of children.

Pornography debases sex, cheapens human life and makes a mockery of our emotions. In pornography, anything is accepted as long as it provides pleasure. Pornography turns sex into a win-lose game where one person gets all the pleasure while the other is subjected to intense pain and humiliation. That is why people addicted to pornography – such as the young man arrested in Nairobi – feel nothing about abusing 8 year old children.

High unemployment among the youth is worsening pornography, prostitution and stripping. Kenya’s economy is not growing fast enough to provide jobs to its youth. Each year, hundreds of thousands of people join the labor market from universities, colleges, high schools and grade school. There are simply not enough jobs for all of them. Its obvious that many of these youth will turn to the sex trade in order to acquire the glitzy lifestyle they so much want to achieve.

A significant number of young women in Kenya earn their living by engaging in relationships with politicians, executives, diplomats, senior state security officials as well as tourists. The relationships involve the lavishing of gifts, housing, cars and cash in exchange for sex. Youthful men are also getting into the game by offering sexual services to upper-class men and women. At Kenya’s coast, there are married men getting involved with female tourists for money with the full knowledge of their own wives.

So brazen has the sex industry become that recruitment is done openly through newspaper classifieds and websites. One notorious website invites job applications complete with a passport photo with promises of, “immediate employment.”

The prolific trade in flesh and pornography is contributing to organized crime in Kenya. Distribution of pornography, emergence of prostitution rackets, human trafficking and sale of narcotics are controlled by vicious mafia-like syndicates that operate outside public view.

It is difficult to tell whether the Kenyan government has the capacity to tackle this brave new form of criminal activity. The so-called “crackdowns” have not succeeded in stemming the vices.

Poster: Counter Human Trafficking Syposium for FBOs and Grassroots in EA

Contact consolationeastafrica@gmail.com or 0736 935 387,  and 0720 812 638 or 0720 444 545

Prison unlocks opportunities for inmates

Published on 14/10/2011

By Kevin Tunoi

Stigmatisation of former prisoners – as bad influence and a menace to the society – leads them to commit more crimes and end up back at the correctional facilities.

Despite this challenge, there is one prisoner who is confident he would be accorded a warm reception when he returns home.

Moses Chirchir, a prisoner at the Ngeria Farm Prison in Uasin Gishu, says the prison has empowered him to be independent and he can be of much help to his community when he is finally released.

With only two months and 10 days to the end of his three-year incarceration, Chirchir has earned credentials after graduating in disciplines that will see him become a productive person once he goes back home.

“I have received a certificate on low cost and appropriate building technology from the Ministry of Housing,” he said.

Chirchir has further acquired a certificate in sustainable agriculture that includes crop husbandry, soil fertility management, integrated pest management and land preparation techniques. He has learned how to make liquid soap, yoghurt, fruit jam and juice.

The inmate has also obtained a comprehensive certificate on peer education.

“I also got trained on HIV/Aids testing and counselling, drugs and substance abuse in relation to HIV/Aids, stigma and discrimination and sexual reproductive health and rights,” Chirchir said.

Chirchir says that come December he will show his family and the community in Cherangany constituency that he has changed for the better.

“When I come out of the prison, I will have a way of making money through the different short courses that I have done behind bars,” said Chirchir.

He emphasizes the importance of organic farming because it improves soil fertility and the food produced has no chemical components that are harmful. “I also learnt of value addition when there is surplus produce. For example, when there is an excess of tomatoes or milk I can make jam or yoghurt,” he said.

The prisoner said that he will pass down the knowledge he has acquired to the youth and women through outreaches.

Fully rehabilitate

Chirchir was not the only one who graduated. Thirty five other prisoners were also awarded certificates in a ceremony that was graced by Georgia Burford of Interact Worldwide, a UK-based non governmental organisation.

Most notable among the graduates were six old prisoners who received proficiency certificates in basic reading, writing and numeracy from the Ministry of Education’s Directorate of Adult and Continuing Learning.

Barnabas Keino, the officer in charge, Ngeria Farm Prison, said that since the certificates don’t indicating that they were awarded in prison, the graduates have a high probability of getting employed. “Most employers fear that people who have been in prison are still criminals and that is the reason they would not employ them.

Barnabas assured employers that former prisoners are capable of change and should not be discriminated against. He said that with the skills that the prisoners have acquired, they can make a living and stay away from criminal activities.

“The HIV/Aids trainings that have been conducted in this and other prisons in Kenya are relevant because the pandemic is affecting both the prison staff and the prisoners alike,” Barnabas said.

Trainings in the prisons have been conducted by Resources Oriented Development Initiative (Rodi), an NGO that has been working with prisoners since 1989.

Ms Esther Bett, the programmes manager of Rodi, says the NGO works with 20 per cent of the prisoners who have completed their terms in a follow up programme.

“We also offer a component of after care for the prisoners who are infected by HIV/Aids by ensuring they produce their own food to supplement the anti retro viral drugs that they are using,” she said.

The NGO is currently working with 60 community groups throughout Kenya formed by ex-prisoners to make them stay away from criminal activities and be financially stable.

Rodi and Interact Worldwide have launched a five-year programme in prisons in Nairobi, Central, Western, Nyanza and Rift Valley provinces aimed at fully rehabilitating the prisoners.

 

Polygamy and HIV and AIDS in South Sudan

RUMBEK,  issue 005 March 1, 2011 (CISA) –

A missionary from the congregation of the Apostles of Jesus has said that South Sudan is a fertile ground for the spread of the virus causing HIV and AIDS infection. Fr Alex Ojiera, who has specialized training on HIV and AIDs, Management and Care, was speaking to Good News Radio on February 28.

Fr Ojiera said that the traditional culture of polygamy and inheritance of widows in South Sudan makes the country a fertile ground for the spread of HIV and AIDs. He explained that a polygamous man who contracts the virus and passes away after infecting his wives, exposes the virus to the community since the widows will be inherited by other polygamous men who will in turn spread it to other sexual partners.

Insisting on the need for awareness about HIV and AIDs by the various communities in South Sudan, Fr Ojier confirmed that pastoral agents are involved in informing the communities about the reality of HIV and AIDS during Eucharistic gatherings, adding that they encourage people to know their status through voluntary testing.

He also said that although one can contract the virus through sharing syringes or even sharp object like razor blades with infected persons, sexual relations remain the major form of passing on the virus.

Good News Radio in Rumbek Diocese is in dialogue with an international Christian organisation called Across, to produce a radio drama program on HIV and AIDs based on a manual called, “I Want To Know: HIV/AIDs Drama for Southern Sudan” in English and Dinka languages.

Across focuses on Sudan to help build communities, improve education, strengthen churches, improve livelihoods and teach people about health.

Kenya: Murugi defended over HIV remarks

Special Programmes minister Esther Murugi. MPs who attended an HIV and Aids workshop she was quoted as having said people with HIV should be segregated came to her defence saying she was quoted out of context February 9, 2011. FILE

By CAROLINE WAFULA

Posted Wednesday, February 9 2011 at 14:54

MPs who attended an HIV and Aids workshop where Cabinet minister Esther Murugi was quoted as having said people with HIV should be segregated came to her defence Wednesday saying she was quoted out of context.

And in a statement to the House, the Special Programmes minister said she only put across the Cuban case of incarceration to foster discussions and debate and never intended to imply that Kenya should adopt a similar strategy.

“This would be contrary to many human rights conventions that Kenya has signed,” she stated, adding that ultimately such an approach would also not be successful in controlling the epidemic.

Her alleged statement sparked an outcry and harsh criticism from rights groups and individuals. Among those who harshly criticized the alleged statements was First Lady Lucy Kibaki who asked the public to ignore what she described as impractical and retrogressive public utterances that threaten to erode achievements in management of HIV and Aids.

She said over 1.45 million Kenyans currently living with HIV deserve care, love and compassion and not confinement or seclusion.

Prime Minister Raila Odinga also distanced the Government from the alleged statement.

Yesterday, the Minister said Kenya has achieved great strides in management of HIV and scaling up services to prevention, care and treatment, with a current prevalence rate of 6 per cent among adults down from 14 per cent in 1990s.

That notwithstanding, country continues to record an average of 122, 000 new infections with couples in heterosexual relationships making up the bulk of the infections.

Referring to Sessional Paper Number 4 of 1997 on Aids in Kenya and HIV and AIDS Prevention and Control Act 2006, the Minister said the Government policy was clear and outlaws discrimination of persons with HIV.

She also quoted Section 33 (2) of the HIV and Aids Prevention and Control Act which states that no person shall be quarantined, placed in isolation, refused lawful entry or deported from Kenya on the grounds of their actual, perceived or suspected HIV status.

“The laws prohibit discrimination on grounds of HIV status, supports the rights of people living with HIV to participate as full actors with dignity and the right to treatment of HIV as part of the right to the highest attainable standards of health.

The Minister was quoted at the workshop that was organized for MPs on January 28 as having said people living with HIV should be isolated.

She was updating members on the progress made and challenges in national response programmes.

She explained that during the participatory discussions and contributions, she provided examples of other countries that have tried to control the epidemic, citing Cuba’s case in 1988 when it incarcerated people with HIV after a massive testing campaign.

She told the House she had informed the meeting that Cuba has always had a very low prevalence rate and very low new infections and in that way, was very different from Kenya.

Cuba withdrew the policy in 1993.

She also cited Rwanda whose prevalence rates have reduced from a peak of 11 per cent in the 90s to 2.8 per cent in recent times.

“In these countries, universal access and country ownership drive the HIV response thus the low HIV incidences and lowered Aids related deaths,” she stated.

MPs who attended the meeting said she was quoted out of context.

Chepalungu MP Isaac Ruto and Bonchari MP Charles Onyancha said they had understood the context under which she had spoken.

“What she said was taken out of context, the press has a strange way of using clips to actually peddle lies,” Mr Ruto said.

“Some of us who were in Mombasa, understood, she was seeking guidance on how to contain further spread of HIV,” said Mr Onyancha.

The minister said she had been wondering where the MPs who attended the workshop had disappeared when she was being “crucified.”

“This has caused me a lot of stress, because I have many good friends who have died of HIV and I have relatives who have HIV,” she said.

The Minister indicated that currently only 57 per cent of Kenya’s adult population has ever tested and this is a cause for concern.

“Controlling an epidemic of this magnitude where 1.5 million people are living with HIV requires a massive scale up of people accessing testing and counselling and disclosing to their sexual partners and accessing a range of prevention services,” she stated.

She stated that while she continues to support the view that Kenya looks at other countries approaches and learn from them in order to rid Kenya of HIV, protecting and promoting human rights will encourage people to come forward and access services and reduce stigma associated with the epidemic

Minister accuse gays of spreading HIV

By Patrick Beja Published on 28/01/2011

A Cabinet minister stirred MPs when she claimed gays were responsible for new cases of HIV/Aids infections and should not be ignored.

Special Programmes minister Esther Murugi said 25 per cent of new infections among sex workers come from gays.

“Men-to-men sex is a major challenge in the war against HIV and Aids that we cannot ignore if we want to succeed,” she said.

The minister said shying away from discussing the plight of sex workers including gays would not win the war against HIV in the country.

Murugi described gays as dangerous sex partners because they also infect their wives and girlfriends with sexually transmitted diseases and challenged MPs to come up with radical suggestions to tackle the problem.

The MPs murmured when she said Cuba at one time came up with a suggestion to lock up HIV victims as part of radical decisions to counter the spread of the scourge.

Last year, Murugi caused uproar when she told a meeting at the Coast that gays should be recognized in society as a way of tackling HIV/Aids.

She had said giving gays their rights would enable the country understand them and hence address the problem.

On Friday, Murugi placed the gays case before the MPs and said they were at great risk of contracting and spreading HIV/Aids.