Abortion Has Become The Only Option Among The Female Students In Most Higher Learning Institutions In Kenya

By Brenda Jeptoo

Worth Noting:

• One of her friends hooked her with a certain doctor who she refused to disclose his identity. Helps out students with the same case. In some cases, some students sell abortion pills for as low as ksh 2,000 but she opted to see the doctor and paid ksh 5,000.
• “I was dating older men and it was tricky because they don’t like using condoms. They are financing your lifestyle so it’s upon you to take care of yourself. I have conceived twice but immediately they know you have done it they move away. They don’t want to interact with you again.
• If you have not had an abortion while in campus, then you deserve a trophy because it’s not easy” she adds.

At the age of 22, Vivian (not her real name) has already had three abortions. A second year student at Rongo university. She had had a strict religious upbringing whose emphasis was good character and morals. But somewhere along the way Vivian deviated from the Holy Scriptures after joining campus. Like other female students, she had to adjust to the freedom of adult life in the university where you are no longer restricted by the hash rules that parents and teachers gave them while still in high school.

When in her first year, she met some ladies whom she shared a hostel with and they later became friends. During weekends they could go to clubs to have fun and would later hook up with rich and old men commonly known to them as “Wababaz” who would sleep with them and in return would give them money which they used to fund their funcy and expensive lives.

For Vivian, it seems like luck was not on her side because when she engages herself in such life she gets pregnant for old men who were old enough to be her father.

When she first realized that she would be a mother, she had to tell either her parents the truth who are would become disappointed for her shameful character and would face a societal shame or secretly terminate the pregnancy and proceed with her studies like nothing happened. As a young girl with lofty dreams and aspiration she chooses the latter.

“My Parents are very strict and I was not ready to have a child, i am still trying to understand myself, so I did not want to risk my future” says Vivian. A

She decides to share the story with one of her friends and the lady came to her rescue. She introduced her to a clinic in Kitere. The doctor gave her two tablets; one was placed under her tongue, while the other one was inserted in her private parts. The two tablets given to her costed her 5 thousand Kenyan shillings,

“The second experience was more painful in a way that i thought was going loose my life. But God helped me and the abortion was successful. Though it took me i a while before I got healed completely and I was able to continue with my daily routine of going to school and do my studies. I would advise any young girl in campus to be contented with what the parents to avoid being used and made to commit series of abortions with the aim of continuing with their studies and achieve their bright future” she says.

Jane (not her real name) is another student from the same institution shares a similar experience. She is an adventurous girl who lives her life to the fullest but evening, the fun come to a screeching halt when she realized she was pregnant.

“When i missed my periods i knew something was wrong because that was unlike me. Aft sometime I remembered on 14th day of February this year (Valentine’s day) i went out with my “mubaba” and after having fun we checked in one of the biggest hotel in Rongo town and one event led to another. I bought a pregnancy test kit and the results came out positively. I texted the guy responsible for the pregnancy, shared with him the results. Interestingly, he sent me ksh 10,000 as if he knew what I was going to say. The money was a clear indication that he wanted me to get rid of the pregnancy” says Jane.

One of her friends hooked her with a certain doctor who she refused to disclose his identity. Helps out students with the same case. In some cases, some students sell abortion pills for as low as ksh 2,000 but she opted to see the doctor and paid ksh 5,000.

“I was dating older men and it was tricky because they don’t like using condoms. They are financing your lifestyle so it’s upon you to take care of yourself. I have conceived twice but immediately they know you have done it they move away. They don’t want to interact with you again.

If you have not had an abortion while in campus, then you deserve a trophy because it’s not easy” she adds.

Other students i spoke to attributed the prevalence in abortions to the societal pressure to live a certain lifestyle which forces a majority of them to look for ” financially stable” men to finance them.

The catch though is that these men are unwilling to use protection and insist on sex without protection on demand leaving female students with few options which are either to accept the raw sex or to continue suffering with financial problems. But because they would not want to strain or struggle financially they opt sex without protection.

Health care services in Rongo university does not provide abortion services to students unless they have a life threatening condition that would require one to abort. Therefore, students have to go off campus to procure unsafe abortion. Sometimes they are forced to travel long distance to find backdoor abortion clinics.

“I receive calls from students asking me if could help in prescribing drugs. They come to us bleeding and most of them lie that they didn’t know that they were pregnant. They mostly come from backstreet clinics after things go west” says one of the doctors in Rongo university clinic.

I don’t participate in such practices. They usually go to chemists and other private clinics, where they are given drugs over the counter. They find it safe there because most of them don’t ask detailed questions for the only thing they are after is money. Unlike here in our clinic where we keep records” he adds

The doctor says that unsafe abortion comes with consequences, which these students fail to fear when considering abortion as the better option. And urges the institutions and society to have forums where students especially female are giving education in dangers of abortions.

By Brenda Jeptoo, communication and media studies, students at Rongo university.