Unemployment lures female youth in Nairobi turn to drugs

Jobless, desperate and eager to forget their plight, Kenyan female youth living in slum districts in the capital Nairobi are turning to drugs. The youth aged between 18 and 30 are using the drugs claiming they help them to face boldly challenges bedevilling them. The drugs include heroine, bhang, Rohypnol and various forms of glue used in shoe making and carpentry, which they sniff. Drug peddling and use in the East African nation is mainly associated with young men in Nairobi and the coastal town of Mombasa. Most women, according to reports by the Kenyan government and United Nations agencies, are used as peddlers to ferry the drugs to various destination within and outside the country. But women in Nairobi's informal settlements are embracing the vice citing tough life and lack of jobs to support themselves. Anita Mburu, is among hundreds of female youths in Nairobi using drugs. The mother of two children aged between two and four has been using drugs for the past two years. The 26-year-old, who lives in Korogocho, an informal settlement in Nairobi, which is home to about 150,000 people, sniffs "thinner" (a chemical used to dilute varnish) everyday to "forget her problems". "This is what keeps me going each day. I use the drug to reduce stress and it makes me not think about my problems," she said. In a day, the young woman sniffs up to four 50ml bottles of the chemical that makes one drowsy and impairs mental processes. "When I sniff the drug, time moves faster and the day ends quickly. You cannot tell that it is already dusk. This is what helps me to pass time," she said. Each 50ml bottle of the chemical is sold in the slum at 0.2 U.S. dollars. "Sometimes when I do not have the money, I take on credit, borrow from friends or share what they have. We understand each other, everyone knows that you cannot have money every day," she said. With her two children, Mburu spends her time on the streets of the capital Nairobi, where she sleeps often, begging from pedestrians. "I sit either on Moi Avenue or Tom Mboya streets with my two children. They help me beg from pedestrians but most of the time I do it myself," she said. Mainly, explains Mburu, she targets men who are smartly dressed. "When you are a woman, it is easier to deal with men than women. A man will feel sympathy for you and give you some money. Most women when you approach them they will cross the road," she said. On a good day, Mburu said she makes 4 dollars. However, most times she makes between two and three dollars. "I use the money to buy food for my children and buy the drugs, which are also available on the streets of Nairobi," she said. Mburu observes that if she had a job, she would not be using the drugs. "I dropped out of school in Form One because my parents could not pay my school fees. I began doing menial jobs for people in the slums but with time, the jobs became scarce and life turned difficult," she said. She said she later got married and gave birth to her two children. "I was living with my husband and helping him raise our children, but he died. I remained with the burden of taking care of them. This has become difficult for me. I found myself turning to drugs," she recounted. Margaret Kioko, who lives in Mathare, a slum district on the East of Nairobi, also shares a similar predicament. Unlike, Mburu, Kioko smokes bhang to forget her predicament. "I smoke bhang, sometimes with heroine, everyday. It makes me feel better and forget the difficulties am facing," she said. Kioko added that she does not have any source of income and her attempts to engage in income-generating activities have failed. "Life in Nairobi has become tough especially for young girls like us," said the 23-year-old. "Getting a job like washing clothes for someone or fetching water is difficult because people prefer older women. Most young women in the slum have turned to drugs," she added. The class eight drop out said hard life in the slums made her resort to taking drugs. "I buy the bhang in the slums at 0.1 dollars. It costs me 0.7 dollars a day," she said. Kioko added she is given the money by her friends or sometimes she works for the peddlers. The habit, however, has come with a heavy price for the two young women. Mburu suffers from chronic chest problems that have seen her lose weight. On the other hand, Kioko is anaemic. "I was told am anaemic because I do not eat a proper diet," she said. According to Dr Simon Kairu, who attended to the women during a recent health camp in Korogocho, most drug abusers suffer from malnutrition since some of them forget to eat or use the money they have on drugs instead of food. He noted that drug abuse among women in the area is on the rise because of various factors that include peer influence and desperation, resulting from lack of jobs. "Most of the young women taking drugs also have children who add a burden to them," he said. The doctor observed that it is a silent crisis that may be attended to when it had exploded.