By Winnie Kabintie

A new campaign dubbed Deliver for Good Kenya, which aims to empower girls and women in four thematic areas in order to achieve gender equality and drive progress in the country was launched on Wednesday.

The Deliver for Good Kenya initiative, which is supported  by the governments of Denmark and Canada, will focus on four key priority areas namely;

• establishing equal land rights
• strengthening women’s access to financing and economic empowerment
• increasing political participation
• improving access to sexual and reproductive health

Speaking at the launch, Ulla Tornaes, Minister of Development Cooperation of Denmark observed that her government has supported the Deliver for Good campaign since inception and has been a longtime partner for development in Kenya.

“Investing in girls isn’t just the right thing to do, it’s the smart thing to do and essential to achieving the development goals in Kenya, Denmark and across the globe,” she said.

Sustainable Development Goals Kenya

According to Teresa Omondi, Executive Director of Fida Kenya, who is also the coordinating partner for the Deliver For Good Kenya campaign, the four thematic areas are in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the campaign will go along way in driving progress in achieving the SGDs in the country.

“The Deliver for Good Kenya campaign creates a necessary platform to mobilize collectively around common goals that move us closer to achieve gender equality and the SDGs”

The Sustainable Development Goals are a collection of 17 global goals set by the United Nations General Assembly in 2015, which form a blueprint of transforming the World by 2030. Gender equality and healthcare are top among the SDGs.

Cabinet secretary for health Cicily Kariuki, who also spoke at the launch of the campaign, noted that despite the efforts made in enhancing gender equality in Kenya, we still have a long way to go.

“The fact that we are yet to implement the two-thirds gender rule, which parliament is supposed to vote on today but whose outcome we can’t bank on because of previous frustrations in the past is a good illustration,” the CS said.

The Deliver for Good Kenya campaign is part of the wider global initiative; Deliver Good, which was launched in 2016 at the Women Deliver Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Kenya was identified as the first country of focus in Africa for the Deliver for Good Campaign after being nominated alongside India and Senegal as the pathfinder countries for the initiative.

Parliament Frustrates Two-thirds Gender Rule Implementation 

Parliament frustrated the legislation of the two-thirds gender rule for the second time on Wednesday after MPs failed to turn up to vote, denying proponents of the Bill the numbers needed for the Bill to sail through. The voting on the Constitutional Amendment Bill (2018) was consequently deferred to February 2019.