The Kiambu County Development Implementation Coordination Committee (CDICC) has embarked on strategies to unmask men who impregnated school girls during the Covid-19 lockdown.
While chairing CDICC in his boardroom Tuesday, the committee chairman Wilson Wanyanga warned that anybody found to have sexually abused school girls during the long holiday occasioned by Covid 19 pandemic will be punished in accordance with the law.
“It is wrong to take advantage of the global pandemic to prey on innocent on girls, thus affecting their life long dreams,” he stated.
During the meeting, the County Director of Education Victoria Mulili told the committee that some 743 girls across the county had been impregnated during the long vacation.
According to the report she tabled, more primary school pupils conceived during the period under review compared to Secondary School students.
Subsequently, 181 local secondary schools girls were confirmed pregnant compared to 562 from the primary section.
The report further revealed that at least 865 Secondary School students had not reported back, following the partial reopening of schools on October 12, owing to various social-economic issues related to the pandemic.
At the primary level, at least 1186 pupils had not reported since the schools re-opened after they were closed abruptly in March 2020 following the outbreak of coronavirus in the country.
“These figures paint a grim picture for girls in the region and there is need to apprehend the perpetrators irrespective of their positions in society,” said the committee chairman, who is also the County Commissioner.
He therefore directed the Director of Education to go further into her assignment by getting the details of the parents or guardians of the affected girls, their actual areas of residence and details on the culprits responsible for the pregnancies.
These details will ultimately enable disciplinary action to be taken against the perpetrators of the unwanted pregnancies.
The County Commissioner reiterated that the pandemic had caused alot of untold suffering on many families globally, thus the government will not relent in bringing to book those who led to suffering of the school girls by putting them in the family way.
“During the pandemic period parents and guardians were busy engaging in various economic activities to put food on the table after some of them lost their jobs. Those who thought this created an opportunity for them to have illicit affairs will be now held personally liable according to the law as children cannot give consent to sexual advances,” said Mr. Wanyanga.
The law dictates that anyone who defiles a minor aged 11 years and below should be sentenced to life imprisonment, perpetrators who defile those aged between 12- 15 years face a jail term of of 20 years, while those who defile girls aged between 16-18 years face an imprisonment of 15 years.
By Lydia Shiloya
