Prostitution in Kenya

BY: HEMPSTONE MWANGALE. Prostitution in Kenya is illegal. However, many foreign men and women indulge in sex tourism, which is thriving at resorts along Kenya's coast. Thousands of girls and boys are involved in full time child prostitution due to poverty in the region.
Factors affecting prostitution
One of the most prominent reasons for prostitution is poverty. Many families guide their children in the direction of prostitution in order to gain salary to help support the family for food and other needs. Girls in particular become extremely vulnerable and desperately need money, and this is when they become the main target for prostitution. Since prostitution is such a profitable activity many families in Kenya allow their children to get into the prostitution industry at a very young age in order to get money.
In Kenya, a sexual encounter with a girl under the age of sixteen can cost ksh300, but can go up to as high as ksh500. This is beneficial because the average Kenyan only earns ksh100 a day which is most definitely not enough to survive. They believe that the money over powers the horrible situation they put their child through. Up to 30,000 girls between the ages of 12 and 14 are being lured into the industry after being promised with riches and trips abroad after the sexual activity is done; as we would conclude nothing is actually given to them afterwards and these girls then fall into the trap of prostitution in which they can’t get out of afterwards.
A study by UNICEF last year found that there is a high level of acceptance of prostitution and commercial sexual abuse not only by tourists, but by the people of Kenya including parents of the girls that are involved in these acts. Girls at a young age are forced into the sexual industry in order to survive; they lose their rights as young children and as they grow older are denied their rights to develop at the natural pace. They lack financial support from their husbands or extended family, they endure economic pressures and because of their instability they have no choice but to view prostitution as an option for themselves. They have now engaged themselves in prostitution not out of necessity but in hope that it will bring them a better life for their family and themselves. They let have let go of their values and morals in order to gain a profit to finically support themselves.
Prostitution and Health in Kenya
Prostitutes in Kenya involve themselves in a risky lottery with HIV/AIDS infection when most of them see up to five partners a night and only use a condom 60% of the time. Injuries like bruises, bones, and fractured bones, also happen to women because of the lack of protection they have against men. HIV/AIDS, herpes, human papilloma virus are all high affecting viruses that women catch through prostitution because of the lack of protection they use amongst themselves. We need to offer more employment to women so as to prevent the high rate in rise in prostitution. let us stop prostitution in Kenya.

LET US SAVE THE KENYAN STREET KIDS

BY: HEMPSTONE MWANGALE. In Kenya's Riverside local homes of Nairobi close to my home... Whenever I go for a walk around the neighborhood or the supermarket the street children will always cluster around me as I emerge from the car. Dirty, ragged, rheumy-eyed, they're often cheerful in a hard, artful dodger way, but they look cold and hungry and they're begging for food. This is a common encounter in many poor countries, but Nairobi is where I have grown and frankly it makes every mundane visit to town a moral assault course. It is always a painful view to see that the government is doing nothing to assist the street children who are innocent and is not they’re wish to be in such kind of a situation.
For Unreported World I've traveled to conflicts and faraway crises in several counties and country’s, but it struck me at last that I didn't have to go far at all to look for an important story. It was time to open my eyes right here. Where had these children come from? Where were their parents? What bleak histories might they tell me - and what did the future hold for them?
As a country we need to come together and decide on clearing the streets by taking the children to school so that we can have a bright future for them. It is so sad how Kenyans contribute money to host events, shows, road shows and yet forget the main problems the country is facing on the streets.
People might think that helping their children alone is important but we forget that all this children are our children and if we help them they will sure make us proud. Everyday as I walk in town I shed a tear for the same street child deserves a chance to learn like everyone else.
We need to make a decision to help our street children for they are the future of tomorrow.