Community volunteer tackle GBV at the grassroots Mwanaisha Hamisi is a community volunteer with Sauti Ya Wanawake Pwani, a grassroots women organisation that advocates for women and children’s rights in the Coastal region. Hamisi has taken it upon herself to be the whistle blower in cases of Gender Based Violence (GBV) within Kisauni, Mombasa County where she lives. She advocates for prevention and response to GBV at the community level through awareness creation forums as well as providing referrals to GBV service providers, and is particularly concerned with cases that involve children. Hamisi has been able to respond to a number of sexual and gender based violence (SGBV) cases. She narrates a case where her intervention led to the arrest and incarceration of a paedophile.
Mwanaisha Hamisi during a follow-up visit to check on the recovery progress of a GBV survivor.
“A mother who sells coconuts by the roadside left her two young daughters in charge and went home to attend to an emergency. However, as she was gone, a man came posing as a customer and asked the older child to go to the shop and buy sweets. He then kidnapped the younger one and defiled her at a nearby forest before abandoning her,” Hamisi narrates. The girl was rescued by a boda boda operator (motorbike transporter) and was reunited with her mother who reported the incident to Hamisi. “We immediately took the child to the Coast General Gender Based Violence Recovery Centre where she received free medical care and psychosocial support,” says Hamisi adding that a comprehensive medical report on the defilement was done. She confirms: “We also reported the case to the area police station.” Though it initially appeared as if the case might go unresolved, the man reappeared at the place where the mother sells her coconuts and the girls were able to identify him. “We notified the police who came and arrested him. The court process found him guilty and he was sentenced to life imprisonment,” explains Hamisi. Sauti Ya Wanawake Pwani, popularly known as Sauti, is an implementing partner of the Peace Initiative Kenya (PIK) Project that is supported by USAID. The PIK Project has continued to work with and build the capacity of community volunteers in Mombasa, Taita Taveta and Kwale counties. Through this engagement, the volunteers have become agents of change at the community level by providing free legal and psychosocial support to gender based violence (GBV) survivors. They also visit schools to create awareness on SGBV and how children can respond in case of violations. The community volunteers also take part in county committee meetings which recognize them and have opened ways for them to reach out to community leaders in assisting survivors of Gender Based Violence.