Rebecca Cheptegei’s killing highlights dangers of femicide in Kenya

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Rebecca Cheptegei’s ******** highlights dangers of femicide in Kenya

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The ******* of Olympic runner Rebecca Cheptegei by her former partner has reignited calls for stronger action against femicide in Kenya.

The 33-year-old Ugandan ***** days after being doused in petrol and set alight by her ex-boyfriend at her home in Trans Nzoia county in western Kenya.

This is not an isolated incident. Kenya has one of the highest rates of ********* against women in *******.

Media reports say that in January alone more than 10 women in the country were victims of femicide,

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as the ******** of women because of their gender.

Jane, not her real name, tells the BBC she has been in hiding for the better part of the year.

She says she is unable to go back to work due to life-changing injuries inflicted by her ex-partner during a brutal stabbing.

“His intention was to ***** me. He stabbed me and left me for *****. Were it not for the neighbours, I would be *****,” Jane recalls.

She says she endured decades of worsening ****** before she left. Her breaking-point was when he started his aggression towards the children, she says.

“It was ***** living with him. I don’t know how I persevered for those many years,” Jane adds.

Her estranged husband continues to harass her.

“I live in *****. He says he wants to finish me off. I can’t sleep at night. I’m now on medication to help with my mental health. I’m not the perpetrator but I’m living like I’m in jail.”

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The ******* of Rebecca Cheptegei has caused outrage in Kenya

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suggested that 38% of women in Kenya aged between 15 and 49 had experienced ********* from an intimate partner.

Groups that offer support to survivors of gender-based ********* say there has been a year-on-year increase in the number of cases.

“On average, we receive up to 50 calls and sometimes 20 walk-ins in a day,” Njeri Migwi tells the BBC.

She is the head of Usikimye – Swahili for “don’t be silent”.

In 2021, then President Uhuru Kenyatta declared gender-based ********* “a national crisis”.

A year later,

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found 41% of married women had experienced physical *********.

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found that between 2016 and 2023, there were more than 500 reported cases of women being ******* in Kenya.

“In 75% of cases, killings were committed by a person who knew the murdered woman – an intimate partner, relative or friend,” the report says.

Sunita Caminha, UN Women specialist on ending ********* against women and ****** in East and southern *******, says that women and ****** of diverse backgrounds have been victims of femicide in a world marred by widespread gender discrimination and inequality.

In the latest UN report on ********* against women and ******, ******* accounts for the largest share, with 20,000 women murdered.

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Rebecca Cheptegei’s mother, Agnes, says her daughter was a “good child”

Long-distance runner Joan Chelimo says the ******** of Cheptegei has left her traumatised.

“I can’t sleep, imagining that someone was just burnt alive,” she adds.

Cheptegei’s ex-partner subsequently also ***** of ***** wounds that he sustained in the ******* on her.

Ms Chelimo is a co-founder of Tirop’s Angels, an organisation formed after the ******** of another athlete, Agnes Tirop.

She says that Cheptegei reported the ****** she faced to police, but “nothing happened”.

“So the perpetrators are not held accountable,” Ms Chelimo adds.

Police have denied claims that Cheptegei reported her life was in danger.

Kenya has passed laws to address gender-based *********, but critics say few concrete measures are in place to tackle the scourge.

Judy Gitau, the ******* regional director for campaign group Equality Now, says that “unfortunately, governments often feel that once they have a law, that’s it – not understanding that laws don’t ******** themselves and they don’t enforce themselves”.

Jane says that over the years her reports of ****** were dismissed.

“Many times, the police say these are domestic quarrels. In fact, one policewoman I spoke to said: ‘We cannot arrest him until he does something.’ I asked her: ‘Do you want him to ***** me?’

“The next day is when he stabbed me,” Jane recalls.

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In 2004, police gender desks were introduced in Kenya to make it easier for women to report cases of gender-based *********, and for investigations to be sped up.

However, only half of police stations have them. Police say this is because of a lack of resources.

In Trans Nzoia, where Cheptegei lived, there are five police stations, but none has gender desks – the only one is at the county headquarters, says Kennedy Apindi, the head of ********* investigations in the county.

“So reporting of these cases is a problem. They are reported late, or they are unreported until you hear about them in the media and that’s when the police come into action,” he adds.

Cheptegei was the third female athlete to **** in Kenya allegedly at the hands of an intimate partner in the last three years.

In 2021, merely five weeks after Agnes Tirop broke a 10km road-running world record in Germany, she was found ******* in her home.

The 25-year-old had multiple stab wounds on her neck and abdomen.

Her partner Ibrahim Rotich was arrested by police 640km (400 miles) away in Changamwe, on Kenya’s coast.

Three years after she was *******, the case is still in court, with Mr Rotich out on bond. He has pleaded not guilty to a charge of *******.

Other cases also run for years.

Ms Gitau, who sits on a judiciary committee set up to review the timelines for cases involving gender-based *********, says the delays are unacceptable.

“There must be prioritisation of GBV [gender-based *********],” she says.

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Agnes Tirop broke the women-only 10km road race world record shortly before she was *******, allegedly by her former partner

Just six months after Tirop’s ********, Kenyan-born Bahrain runner Damaris Muthee Mutua was found ***** in her home in Iten, a running hub in Kenya’s Rift Valley.

A police autopsy revealed that the 28-year-old had been strangled.

Nobody has been convicted of her ********.

Police said they were looking for her boyfriend in connection with the ******.

Just like Cheptegei, both athletes allegedly reported quarrels over money and property with their partners before meeting their deaths.

In many East ******** communities, gender-based ********* is driven by patriarchal beliefs, placing women in subordinate roles. Their independence is limited, and ********* is normalised as a form of control.

Ms Gitau is calling for more safe houses for survivors.

“Deep down, our attitudes, the norms that we hold as a country, still view women in a certain light,” she says.

Expressing a similar view, Ms Chelimo says the substantial amount of money that female athletes make, or stand to earn, leaves them vulnerable.

“They go against traditional gender norms… Female athletes are now becoming more independent, financially independent, and the other gender is really upset about it,” Ms Chelimo adds.

The government says it is running sensitisation programmes, while reviewing legislation to tackle gender-based *********.

“We don’t want this to happen to any other woman, whether an athlete, or from the village, or a young girl. We need to make sure that the gender police officers are doing their work,” Rachel Kamweru from Kenya’s State Gender Department tells the BBC.

Jane says her life rests in the government’s hands, and she hopes that it will do more to protect women like her from their ex-partners.

“As long as he is free, I’ll never have peace,” she says.

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