These are the preliminary remarks made by Justice Njoki Ndungu of the Supreme Court of Kenya, before she read out the official speech made by the Chief Justice and President of the Supreme Court of Kenya, Hon. Martha Koome at the  launch of the research report on “Creating impact at the local level for girls: Learning from girls’ education interventions in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda”.  Authored by Jaslika, the report launch which took place at a dinner event on 17 April 2024 in Nairobi,  was the highlight of the 3-day regional conference organised by Jaslika in partnership with RELI Africa convened under the theme “From data and commitment to action: Creating a regional movement for girls’ education”.

Ladies and gentlemen, the development partners who are here are here supporting this and the leaders of this very important initiative, All Protocols Observed. Mr. Otieno, when I walked in, he had promoted me to be the Chief Justice of the Republic of Kenya and the President of the Supreme Court, but it is not yet my time. What I am doing here is representing the Chief Justice of the Republic of Kenya and the President of the Supreme Court, Martha Kome, who gives her apologies. She really wanted to be here today, but was unable. She had some other commitments.For those of you who may know Hon. Martha Koome, she has been a champion of children's rights for a very long time, even before she was the chair of FIDA in the days when we were supported by Dr. Wamahiu, and a lot of things that we were doing around children's rights and women's rights issues. Some of you were not born then or were you. It was quite a long time ago, but the Chief Justice has always been a champion.

As recently as two years ago, she was still pushing for the amendments to the Children's Act. She has been a champion of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and on family law. And I see some of our old friends from the old days, like the Girl Child Network, still pushing on, which is great. I want to congratulate the Girl Child Network for just keeping the cause. Because I'm representing the Chief Justice, and you know she's the head of an arm of government, I do have her official speech, which I must read. But before I do so, I thought to myself, having had the wisdom of elders from Dr. Sheila, and having sat chatting with Dr. Mugo, and listening to what we've heard today from RELI, from our young star, comparatively, Dr. Chepkemoi. You know, I think that there are some things which have made me reflect, as I was just listening.

And I felt transported back to the days when I was a member of parliament, moving the section of the Offences Bill, in a house in parliament that was filled with patriarchy and opposition. And, you know, I always say that we always vote for the cultural bastions in our society, who do not want any change. And I'm listening and I'm thinking, we seem to still have the same challenges. And the pushback is actually real. And I'm transported back to those days when I was thinking, how do I engage the men in the community? How do I engage the members of parliament? How do I engage the teachers? How are we going to engage all the partners that we need? Because it is difficult. And yet after all these years, you'd think we would have moved somewhat. And we have. Because even those percentages which were being shown on the board, they look so challenging.

But if we were to compare 20 years ago, we have moved, even if we haven't moved as much as we would have wanted to. Outside of the work I do as a judge, I still do a lot of women's rights work. I am the chair of the Board of Trustees of the Gender Violence Recovery Centers at Nairobi Women's Hospital. We receive and treat a lot of girls, children who come to us. I still run a program called the Big Big Sister, in which I go to girls' schools to talk to them about sexual and reproductive health, which is a main issue for me. And therefore, I also believe I belong to this network. I don't know if you join the network by application. I don't know if it's individual or organisation, but whichever way it is, I will be happy to join and support this network as we move forward. We've talked about the stories about the sanitary towels. And again, I went back to the days when I was in parliament, when we were lobbying for the zero rating of sanitary towels. And just about a month ago, I was watching parliament debating, and I watched this member of parliament talking about how we cannot discuss sanitary towels in parliament, because culture does not allow. And I thought to myself, oh my goodness, we've gone back to 2006, when, no, 2003, when we were trying to champion for the zero rating, and those were the same things that were being said. And we had to still educate these older leaders until they agreed with us.

And it looks as if we have gone full circle. Are we starting the journey again? And if we are, those of us who are older may not have enough energy. And that's why the intergenerational discussion is so important, because now we need the younger, the younger activists to go with their banner and now to move on. If we've gone full circle, it means we have to start as well, the full circle with the energy, with the activism, so that we are able to get what we need for the girls. It is also true that there is pushback. Everyone's talking about the boy child, as if we cannot talk about both. I keep on repeating, you know, wherever I go, boy child and girl child, they're equal, but they're different. And therefore the issues that are affecting the girl child are not the ones affecting the boy child. And therefore we do not leave our energies for with one and focus on the other, which sometimes out there, that's what people say. They say we've had enough of the girl child, it's time for the boy child. That's not true.

It's just that our issues are different. And therefore we have to push for the differences that affect each of those genders. I was thinking today as I was working in the little room, getting all my little books, because see I was collecting everything, because you know I'm an older mom. So my children are relatively young. And they're of the age group of the children we are talking about. And I just thought to myself, you know, I'm a champion. I've talked to my son about consent. I've talked to my children about puberty and what to expect. And then I just thought, but I wonder, have I talked to my son about sanitary towels? If I showed him a packet of sanitary towels, would he know what it is? So even I also need to push that further step that we are looking to ask the parents in the village to do, but even us who are educated and privileged, I think we also need to remember we need to also be part of that process of educating both our boys and girls. I would not to go much into what you have talked only that everything you have said has touched me. All the challenges that you have spoken about have always been there.

And I think it's great that you have a network that holds hands and pushes forward. I think in unity you find strength. And I think this is what you've done. And I'm very happy to be here today on behalf of the Chief Justice. I think I'll have to give a full brief of what I've learned today, because the work you're doing is actually amazing.

Now let me turn to the remarks of the Chief Justice of the Republic of Kenya.