AFTER years of being side-lined, Kenyan women have put down a marker for things to come when presidential and legislative elections are held on August 9.
Their hopes have been bolstered by the selection of a formidable female politician, Martha Karua, as the running mate of presidential candidate Raila Odinga.
So, on Saturday, at the Catholic
University of East Africa in Nairobi, women congregated to launch the Million Women for Martha (MW4M) movement that they hope will send the Odinga/Karua team all the way to State House.
The event was themed around women empowerment and leadership in the country.
Underpinning this is the fact that many Kenyan women see Karua’s choice, as presidential running mate, as a chance for them to get closer to the top of the seat of power.
Over the years, some Kenyan women have contributed to leadership roles in the country, but supporters of MW4M feel that they are generally marginalised.
Now they hope that Karua’s role will make a huge difference in Kenya and they are not going to let this opportunity slip by.
To drive home the point, Muslim women who were supposed to be celebrating Eid Al Adha turned out in force to endorse MW4M.
Dr Ida Odinga, the wife of Raila Odinga, set the scene in her keynote speech.
‘As women, we’ve come a long way to be here today.
‘In this country we have always struggled for women to get recognition.
‘Our aim is one, that the woman of Kenya is elevated 10 times than we are now,’ she told her audience.
Karua, who addressed the crowd for some 40 minutes, emphasised the need for Kenyan women to ensure free and fair elections, change the trajectory of the state, and rebuild trust among communities especially with the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission.
She stressed the power of numbers of women to drive such change forward.
Karua noted: ‘When
leaders stray, we must use our voices to speak out and tell them this does not represent us.’
She said she was grateful to Kenyan women for independently mobilising themselves to contribute to a ‘historic change for the nation and for generations across the country’.
She described the MW4M as a new dawn and said it was a long journey that Kenyan women were undertaking.
‘The journey of this movement goes on even after the 9th of August, until we are liberated socially, economically and politically.
‘Once this is done, we then will have changed the world because we, women, are the nurturers.’ Karua added.
All in all, the women who attended the event were confident that they were moving in the right direction and that their numbers would make a huge difference in the August elections.
One delegate at the conference told Africa Briefing: ‘The event was a success and an indication that when women band together, they can move mountains.’
