| Women’s Rights |
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A new born child is always a joy to the mother, spouse, family and community. However, women who give birth to children with mental disabilities are highly stigmatized by their own community and society at large. The high levels of stigma often lead to maltreatment and abuse of these mothers. The innocent women face unfamiliar situations that are confusing and startling. This traumatizes and affects them very deeply. A child in need of extensive support due to mental disabilities should be considered inspiring and divine. But when the mother, spouse and family are unable to cope, they consider the situation unfortunate and a curse or test from God/Universe. The mother’s inability to cope in this case is misunderstood and labeled to be her problem, her challenge, her curse and/or bad omen. All, including the immediate family and spouse reject the mother, stigmatize and in most cases ostracize her from the community. The mother is abandoned and condemned for bearing the child with mental disabilities, and all her rights disregarded. She is made to bear the brunt of bringing up the child with mental disabilities. The mother is one among 3.5 million women who are very highly disadvantaged by giving birth to children with mental disabilities. The disadvantaged women are unable to earn a living. The demand for intensive support for their children is a full time and life-long commitment. Even those mothers who have children with mild mental disabilities are unable to earn reasonable income due to interrupted work schedules. The result is women who are economically disempowered and fully incapacitated. This category of women is deprived of the right to stay in marriage, family and community due to association with mental disabilities. They are denied the right to lifelong support for their children and adults with mental disabilities. They struggle very hard to cope with the burden of mental disabilities. Theirs is truly a labor of love. It is time for this category of women to realize that the responsibility of providing intensive and life long support to persons with mental disabilities is one of the obligations of the Government. These women must salvage their rights including that of a parent. They must not succumb to unfair condemnation and judgment. If they are unable to cope with mental disabilities, it is the community and the government that is to blame, NOT themselves. The community and government have failed to provide sustainable and intensive support needed by children and adults with mental disabilities; thus showing a great deal of irresponsibility. This right to support is provided for in Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCPRD) that Kenya has signed and ratified. This right to support must not be mistaken to imply guardianship. It must be adopted in Kenya’s legislation and entrenched in the constitution. This is the only way to develop relevant legislation, required to facilitate a mechanism that guarantees the right to support for persons with mental disabilities. The provision of sustainable support by the government will ease the burden of mental disabilities on mothers. This is the only way they will be able to reclaim their rights in society. The concept of the Carers Programme of KSMH is a mechanism that expresses the right to basic support for children and adults with mental disabilities. The programme takes away the responsibility for full time care of children from the mothers, giving them an opportunity to go out and earn a living. The public should understand that the right to intensive and full time support for persons with mental disabilities is not exclusively the responsibility of the mother, the spouse and/or the family. It is to the greatest extent the responsibility of the Government. The six-month campaign on the rights of women deprived of their fundamental human rights for bearing children with mental disabilities aims at:
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