Girl child must be freed from the shackles of culture and tradition

Two years ago, my daughter, who was still in high school, was upbraided by her mother for not carrying out some routine chore in the kitchen.

After brooding for a while, on her way to the kitchen, she jokingly muttered something about “child labour” which I didn’t quite catch, but which still left me in stitches.

Since I was not sure that she had read section 53 (d) of the Bill of Rights which expressly forbids hazardous or exploitative labour for children, I only told her that if she wanted to eat, she had to obey her mother without question.

But it set me thinking about my own childhood and what the framers of the Constitution 2010 would have thought of it.

I was born in the village, and we not only had to labour, but also suffer serious consequences like going to bed hungry if we shirked our duties.

If there was any law protecting us, we didn’t know about it, nor would we have done anything about it.

But now our Constitution seeks to protect children with unique rights under the law, including the right to be looked after by their families, to be schooled, and even the right not to be forced to work.

The Children’s Act Chapter 141 says: “Every child shall be protected from economic exploitation and any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child’s education, or to be harmful to the child’s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development.”

But it appears that not many people in this country are aware of these rights — especially where the girl child is concerned.

That is why the United Nations fixed Saturday October 11 as the International Day of the Girl Child.

NEAR-TOTAL SILENCE

But as happened in the past two years since its inception, it is a day that will be marked in near-total silence from the political establishment.

Most likely, only the concerned local and international civil society organisations will show that they care through activities that will be mainly attended by fellow-travellers.

But the way I look at it, Kenyans in general should be a lot more concerned about the vulnerability of the girl child.

To start with, girls are different from you and me. Not only do they get pregnant before they know what hit them due to ignorance, they are also likely to get married off long before they reach the age of consent.

Many others are forced to drop out of school because their parents just do not see the value of educating girls.

To such parents, girls are like calves — to be looked after until they reach an age when they can fetch a decent bride-price.

This results in the abominable child marriage which is a great loss to any country.

MOST ESSENTIAL INGREDIENTS

But then you might ask yourself: Why should this veteran scribe be so exercised about the fate of the girl child? To which there are two answers.

First, those scrawny, flat-chested wenches who you refuse to take to school are the same ones who will grow up to be curvaceous, mouth-watering dishes in the future (an unforgivably sexist observation, to be sure).

So why refuse to prepare their minds so they can become independent, mature human beings who can think for themselves and others?

The second reason is even more important. I am a firm believer that no country can develop without the full participation of women.

Not only are they our mothers and wives and therefore the propagators of our race, they are also the most essential ingredients in the life and health of every nation.

The wealthiest, most developed nations are those that recognised early that by allowing the liberation of their women, they were freeing a vital spiritual force that would help free their own minds from the blinkers of stereotype, paternalism and mediocrity.

Even if it is true that some very rich countries, especially in the Middle East, still keep their women in fetters inside the veils, the only reason they survive is because they have oil. What will happen, Allah forbid, should the oil run out?

No, I don’t believe in the shrill, ball-breaking ideology of feminism. There is a great deal of negativity in this form of activism, which is outdated anyway.

Nor do I believe in affirmative action, especially in higher education, which is why I am totally opposed to the trend of lowering grades for women entering university.

That enters into the realms of reverse discrimination and is also a form of paternalism that should not be entertained.

What I do believe in is that the girl child must be freed from the tradition-bound shackles which have for too long kept her in bondage.

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