Residents of Kiambu have been advised to accept former offenders back into the society in an effort to facilitate their transformation.
Speaking at the Kirigiti Rhabilitation centre in Kiambu sub-county on Tuesday, the manager of the institution, Caroline Towett said the main objective of rehabilitation centres was to help the offenders to reform and get back to their normal lives without offending anyone in the society.
She cited incidents where some girls who had been rehabilitated at the institution were rejected by the society due to their previous offences and this compelled them to return to the institution for their safety.
Towett said that efforts to empower the girls had been put in place as they were trained on life skills which included tailoring, bakery and hair dressing to supplement the normal education systems.
She added that they offered stress and anger management as well as counseling to enable them gain self-control and patience.
Towett said the institution was able to notice the change in the self-actualisation lessons where they trained the girls on how to believe in themselves and have the will power to change.
The manager further noted that the girls engaged in clubs like the cultural club which enabled them to understand different African cultures and their morals and how to practise them during and after their stay at the rehabilitation centre.
She observed that the clubs also helped the girls in interacting among themselves hence facilitating peer education and collective rehabilitation and education which she said was important in life.
Towett also said that people should differentiate rehabilitation centres from mental schools as they were different with each having their own respective clients.
Towett explained that a child can be naughty either because of degradation of morals, being mentally challenged or if they suffer from a psychiatric disorder, and it was only assessment which could guide the handlers on the best institution for each case.