“COTU is committed to agitating for Kenyan Workers Rights both socially and economically and at the same time act as an alternative source of guidance to the government on matters of national importance,” says Hezron Owallo, Director of Organisations at COTU.

He was speaking at a breakfast meeting hosted by the League of Kenya Women Voters (LKWV) to look into the cost of gender based violence on the labour market and the economy.

“Despite its widespread existence in our society, Kenyan laws do not comprehensively recognize these forms of violence,” he adds.

The employment Act (Cap.226) and other instruments of labour legislation that apply to recruitment, promotion and dismissal, training and vocational opportunities and the terms and conditions of employment should be amended to recognize such vices.

Josephine Wandago of LKWV questions how women can be productive at work if they are beaten and raped at home. She adds that they suffer not only the consequences of these attacks but also from the stress of constantly concealing this reality and their responses.

“A lot of women victims of violence choose to stay with the abuser due to joint interest in property, whether rented or owned,” she notes.

A survey carried out by the UN-Habitat in Nairobi that sampled 195 women concerning their experience of gender based violence indicated that; one in every four women respondents suffers from economic, physical or emotional violence.

And that one in every five women was sexually harassed in the workplace or institutions of learning.

Irene Oloo, the Executive Director of the LKWV says that gender-based violence erodes the economy, all the more reason why it deserves national attention and response.

“The gross domestic product of the country can be greatly affected by the cost of violence,” she adds.

Women agreed that the cost of violence is felt on a cumulative basis and called for the prioritization of gender bills that are pending in Parliament to incorporate a national policy on gender-based violence.

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