Gender roles and the status of the rights of children in pioneer location, Uasin Gishu County, Kenya

Abstract

The Children Act 2010 accords children in Kenya inalienable rights. This study, based in Pioneer Location, Uasin Gishu County of Kenya, sought to investigate whether or not the duties and responsibilities assigned to children on the basis of their genders in the family households affect their rights to survival and development. The study was guided by two specific objectives. First was to examine how gender roles are ascribed by family households and second to analyze how gender roles affect the rights of children. While the rights of a child are many, this study is limited to investigating how the child’s right to survival, that include right to proper feeding and nutrition, life before and after birth, clothing and shelter, health and medical care, and sanitation and safer water for drinking, as well as the right to development that include right to education, play and leisure and access to information about HIV/AIDS, may affect gender roles in society. The theoretical framework that guided this study was the Conflict Theory by sociology thinker Karl Marx (1818). The study adopted a descriptive survey method which targeted 24% of the total family households in Eldoret town. The study sample size was 280 adult family households with parenting responsibilities. Respondents were identified using snowballing sampling where initial subject with desired characteristic was identified using purposive sampling. A total of 25 key informants with 9 questions on interviews schedule administered to Civil servants and NGOs officers that include teachers, children Officers, Children lawyer, ELDOWAS, gender officers, school inspectors, health workers, social workers, local village elders and religious leaders who were identified purposely. Data was collected using 15 questionnaires from family household’s settlements in Pioneer. The analysis was done using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 17 and Excel. The data was presented using frequency tables, charts and bar graphs. Study findings shows despite increasing school enrollment amongst girls than boys in 2008 in Pioneer zone, the effects of absenteeism, school dropout and lack of accesses to proper feeding and nutrition were linked to poor survival and development rights among girls. High demand for girls to undertake reproduction and domestic roles in the households infringe girls’ health, medical care and enjoyment derived from play and leisure. In general, the study justifies that there was persistent violation of children rights influenced by gender roles. The study suggests for strong interventions from the multi-agencies working on children’s rights to create awareness among members of the community against the dangers of transgressing of child right and in finding lasting solutions to gender imbalances created by societal roles played by children within Pioneer location and in the larger Uasin Gishu County