Unreported cases of early pregnancies among young girls in Magarini sub-county, Kilifi County, could be outweighing the reported ones following what is believed to parents resorting for abortion for their daughters from village witch doctors.
A new revelation has it that most of the parents, especially mothers, have switched to a new approach of abortion where they take their girls to witch doctors as opposed to hospitals, so as to avoid confrontation from authorities.
Joyce Dama Kambi, the Chief Executive Officer of Sauti ya Wanawake in Magarini said that her organisation once came across a case where a mother took her 15-year-old pregnant daughter to be smeared a certain traditional medicine on the stomach by a witch doctor.
Dama said that cases of parents turning village witch doctors into abortion specialists reach Sauti ya Wanawake when the abortion process goes awry.
"There is a case we are following up of a girl who was taken to a certain witchdoctor for abortion by her mother. We learned of the heartbreaking step a mother can think of to her daughter when the minor was rushed to hospital after everything at the witch doctor backfired,” she said.
The Sauti ya Wanawake boss said that the mobile court that was recently installed in Magarini by the national government through the Judiciary system so as to bring justice to local citizens on issues such as rape to young girls has been dormant, adding that no rape suspect has been convicted, despite the alarming rape cases in the sub-county.
The figures of young girls being impregnated, especially during this year’s national examination period, is currently raising eyebrows in the country. According to statistics from Kilifi County Coordinator for Children Services, George Misigo, approximately 13,000 are from Kilifi County.