Establish Girls' Empowerment Centre in Rural Kenya

During the period under review (May – July 2016), NIGEE finalized the Girls’ Empowerment Centre (GEC) within Kisumu.

• Additional 20 girls from slums of Kisumu have been enrolled for vocational skills training. 10 are currently undergoing computer training, 10 are waiting to start hairdressing and dressmaking training. Training equipments and materials are available.
• Awareness and demand creation was conducted through meetings organized by the Local Administration, chiefs and / assistant chiefs of the 4 major slums. The community has embraced the program and are willing to reach as many girls as possible.
• Life skills and counselling sessions have are ongoing at the centre.
• Established a small hostel within the GEC to offer boarding facilities for the girls.
• Casual trainers for the vocational skills training at the GEC have been recruited.

The girls have continued to appreciate the donors who have made this project (GEC) a reality. The second group of computer class are soon graduating.  Below is a story of a new GEC beneficiary:

Belinda : ‘Down but not out!’

Belinda is 21 years old and she’s the first born in her family. She is amongst the beneficiaries who successfully completed their secondary school education last year after joining the NIGEE scholarship program in 2013. Her mother who was sole breadwinner passed on while she was still in primary school. They left with their father who wasn’t keen on supporting the family and didn’t believe in educating a girl - Putting food on the table was quite a challenge for them and on many occasions they went hungry. Belinda sat for her National Primary Examinations (KCPE) in 2010 and scored 311 marks out of the possible 500. She then joined Thurgem Secondary School in 2010, studied for one year and then dropped out due to lack of school fees since her father could not afford it. She stayed out of school for one year.

 “Life was very difficult in the year 2012 when I dropped out of school” narrates Belinda. Getting personal effects became a bigger challenge and she didn’t have an option so she opted to get involved with a man who could provide her basic needs like sanitary towels and other personal effect. In the event, she got pregnant during the relationship and the man refused to take responsibility for the pregnancy. To support her child she was forced to do manual work for people within her community to raise funds. It’s at this point that she got married to a man who promised to support her only to discover that the man had a first wife and she was therefore going to be the second wife. Two months into the marriage she found it unbearable and then she escaped.

In 2013, she was recruited as a beneficiary and she went back to school and sat for her secondary examinations (KCSE) last year and scored a C. “NIGEE changed my life and gave me a new perspective. I am now able to take care of my child,” she says.

Belinda currently benefits from the various programs offered by the GEC. For her, the GEC is a platform to explore boundless possibilities that will help her be a good role model for her child. “I thank NIGEE for empowering me and making me proud of myself,” she concludes.

She’s one of the beneficiaries to benefit from the new hostel facilities at the Girls’ Empowerment Centre since her family lives far from the centre and she has no relative in Kisumu.