Kenya: Free Pads Should Benefit The Needy

[Guest guest]

Free Pads Should Benefit The Needy

Saturday, 28 May 2011 00:05 BY ANDREA BOHNSTEDT

It's that time of the year again: Budgets are due to be read shortly, and I'm

sure Uhuru Kenyatta and his colleagues are working late, rounding up the

millions, and mapping out Kenya's spending for the fiscal year ahead. Prime

Minister Raila Odinga also has some points he'd like to see included, and I'm

not talking about the need or otherwise to book presidential suites for him.

Odinga has ordered the treasury to earmark funds so that schools can provide

sanitary pads for girls.

The Focus Group (read: Facebook friends) discussed this issue online. There

were a number of people who didn't quite see the point: `What next?', one

commenter said. `Will we have to give them sick leave? " Well no, and that's not

really the point. I asked him (of course it was a him) whether he had ever had a

period. This was a rhetorical question, but he still answered with an indignant,

capital-lettered NO. Just what I thought.

Condoms are subsidised by donors, and the state launched an initiative to

provide free circumcision services for men back in 2008 to reduce the spread of

HIV. Now you can prevent the spread of HIV through intercourse by not having

intercourse. There's an element of choice in keeping your tackle in your

trousers (for men at least – unfortunately, women don't always have that choice

whether the guy will keep it in his pants). With periods, in contrast, you have

considerably less choice, and I think it is entirely fair and defensible that a

budget should address uniquely female needs.

But I found it encouraging that a good number of guys were a lot more

understanding. And this was not the end of the argument. The guy who had

initiated the discussion in the first place was not convinced that government

should be involved in providing sanitary pads as, he argued, this was an area

that was well covered by NGOs already. Why should the state interfere? Another

one commented that having sanitary pads would make little difference to girls'

education if they were hungry, if the classroom had a crumbling roof and they

had to race home when it rained, or there were other such restrictions. And yet

another said that money for sanitary pad allocations would surely be spent in a

way that someone got rich of it.

All interesting points, and a lot more productive to think about than the first

guy's (non) argument. That money set aside for a specific purpose will be

misused is by no means specific to sanitary pad allocations, but occurs across

the board. Check the CDF reviews, or ponder where the money for the youth work

campaign went. MARS Group are still asking where millions of shillings from the

2007/08 and 2008/09 fiscal years went. And pads can be bought at bulk rates from

a local manufacturer who will make money - like any contractor or supplier to

government.

But I was even less convinced of the argument that this is an area that should

be left to NGOs: For one, I didn't buy that NGOs had this well covered. And then

there is the more substantial issue that leaving this to NGOs essentially means

that the state has failed: Failed to look after the needy ones of its girl

citizens. Why should they have to depend on NGO charity handouts and not be

looked after by the state?

This NGO involvement also contributes to the fact that girls' periods and

sanitary pads are such a standalone issue. In an ideal scenario, there would be

a local healthcare outreach service that has already integrated this in its

service provisions, that teaches families about the whole range of basic

healthcare issues: why it's important to wash hands, drink clean water, prevent

diarrhea and dehydration. And also why girls should have pads – several people

interestingly pointed out that of course not all families are poor, but often

decide that pads are not a necessity. And anything else that kids, both male and

female, need to know about reproductive health issues (including, perhaps,

making boys understand this whole period thing). If the state had this capacity

on the local level, there wouldn't be a multitude of NGOs splitting this up into

single-issue campaigns, riding in their four-wheel drives to do sanitary pads

today, hand-washing campaigns tomorrow. This takes money: the treasury needs to

fund a public health service. But it is of course more than just a financial

allocation. It requires political will to build a competent, effective,

non-corrupt public health service.

As it stands, an allocation for sanitary pads, as much as I defend the right

and the need to budget for specifically female issues, might just end up like

free primary education: Free in principle, as long as you pay the desk fee and

the motivation fee and whatever other fees there are.

http://www.nairobistar.com/business/andrea-bohnstedt/26114-free-pads-should-bene\

fit-the-needy-

[Guest guest]

Free Pads Should Benefit The Needy

Saturday, 28 May 2011 00:05 BY ANDREA BOHNSTEDT

It's that time of the year again: Budgets are due to be read shortly, and I'm

sure Uhuru Kenyatta and his colleagues are working late, rounding up the

millions, and mapping out Kenya's spending for the fiscal year ahead. Prime

Minister Raila Odinga also has some points he'd like to see included, and I'm

not talking about the need or otherwise to book presidential suites for him.

Odinga has ordered the treasury to earmark funds so that schools can provide

sanitary pads for girls.

The Focus Group (read: Facebook friends) discussed this issue online. There

were a number of people who didn't quite see the point: `What next?', one

commenter said. `Will we have to give them sick leave? " Well no, and that's not

really the point. I asked him (of course it was a him) whether he had ever had a

period. This was a rhetorical question, but he still answered with an indignant,

capital-lettered NO. Just what I thought.

Condoms are subsidised by donors, and the state launched an initiative to

provide free circumcision services for men back in 2008 to reduce the spread of

HIV. Now you can prevent the spread of HIV through intercourse by not having

intercourse. There's an element of choice in keeping your tackle in your

trousers (for men at least – unfortunately, women don't always have that choice

whether the guy will keep it in his pants). With periods, in contrast, you have

considerably less choice, and I think it is entirely fair and defensible that a

budget should address uniquely female needs.

But I found it encouraging that a good number of guys were a lot more

understanding. And this was not the end of the argument. The guy who had

initiated the discussion in the first place was not convinced that government

should be involved in providing sanitary pads as, he argued, this was an area

that was well covered by NGOs already. Why should the state interfere? Another

one commented that having sanitary pads would make little difference to girls'

education if they were hungry, if the classroom had a crumbling roof and they

had to race home when it rained, or there were other such restrictions. And yet

another said that money for sanitary pad allocations would surely be spent in a

way that someone got rich of it.

All interesting points, and a lot more productive to think about than the first

guy's (non) argument. That money set aside for a specific purpose will be

misused is by no means specific to sanitary pad allocations, but occurs across

the board. Check the CDF reviews, or ponder where the money for the youth work

campaign went. MARS Group are still asking where millions of shillings from the

2007/08 and 2008/09 fiscal years went. And pads can be bought at bulk rates from

a local manufacturer who will make money - like any contractor or supplier to

government.

But I was even less convinced of the argument that this is an area that should

be left to NGOs: For one, I didn't buy that NGOs had this well covered. And then

there is the more substantial issue that leaving this to NGOs essentially means

that the state has failed: Failed to look after the needy ones of its girl

citizens. Why should they have to depend on NGO charity handouts and not be

looked after by the state?

This NGO involvement also contributes to the fact that girls' periods and

sanitary pads are such a standalone issue. In an ideal scenario, there would be

a local healthcare outreach service that has already integrated this in its

service provisions, that teaches families about the whole range of basic

healthcare issues: why it's important to wash hands, drink clean water, prevent

diarrhea and dehydration. And also why girls should have pads – several people

interestingly pointed out that of course not all families are poor, but often

decide that pads are not a necessity. And anything else that kids, both male and

female, need to know about reproductive health issues (including, perhaps,

making boys understand this whole period thing). If the state had this capacity

on the local level, there wouldn't be a multitude of NGOs splitting this up into

single-issue campaigns, riding in their four-wheel drives to do sanitary pads

today, hand-washing campaigns tomorrow. This takes money: the treasury needs to

fund a public health service. But it is of course more than just a financial

allocation. It requires political will to build a competent, effective,

non-corrupt public health service.

As it stands, an allocation for sanitary pads, as much as I defend the right

and the need to budget for specifically female issues, might just end up like

free primary education: Free in principle, as long as you pay the desk fee and

the motivation fee and whatever other fees there are.

http://www.nairobistar.com/business/andrea-bohnstedt/26114-free-pads-should-bene\

fit-the-needy-