In an article titled How Kenya’s justice system is failing single mothers, Miriam Wachira, a lawyer, outlines the justice system’s failed rehabilitation and reformation attempts when it comes to single mothers who break the law.

Single mothers draw a lot of contempt from society, when in reality women who do the sole responsibility of raising children are tougher than any other woman on the planet.

Parenting was designed to be done by two parents. Just like one parent cannot conceive without the other, one parent cannot raise a well-rounded individual by themselves. This is not a blow to any single parent, this is reality when it comes to the emotional and psychological development of any young person. A child needs both their mother and father to thrive.

While lawyer Wachira speaks eloquently and factually about the legal shortcomings of proper reformation methods when it comes to single mothers who find themselves on the wrong side of the law, I would like to pivot and speak about the societal and judicial acceptance of neglectful fathers.

Yasin* (not his real name) spoke to me about meeting his father after many years at a crowded event. Even though he is barely a teenager, Yasin mustered the courage to go and greet his father only to be chastised with scornful remarks of, “You have finally come to greet me after greeting everyone else!” While the father’s behaviour was contemptible, what I found more disgusting was that the people around tried to pacify Yasin by preaching to him about the importance of forgiving his father.

Yassin and his father live within a 5km radius of each other, yet they have not seen each other for years. The father does not provide for his children nor does he inquire after them. It is, therefore, not surprising that Yasin and his siblings have no feelings towards their father.

A few weeks ago, Hadija Sheban, a popular TikTok cook from Mombasa, put her ex-husband on blast when he would not answer the phone or follow up with his insurance when his children were in hospital. He wasn’t bothered about his children and had put his new wife as the beneficiary of his medical aid. Sheban took to TikTok to lament about the issue and warned many women about this pandemic of men abandoning their children.

Stories like that of Yasin and Sheban are very prevalent among communities at the Coast. Men, especially of the Muslim faith, are not held accountable when it comes to providing for their children after divorce, and many women feel defeated when the Kadhi’s court does not enforce provision as per the guidance of the Sharia.

Women also find it draining and time consuming to take these cases through children’s court. Therefore, a woman is often left abandoned, forced to return to her parents’ house or to fend for herself. The father moves on, remarries and forgets about his children… until they are grown and he is in need.

I am often baffled at the lack of accountability on a man who abandons his children. It has become such a norm that there is little expectation for a man to provide after divorce, with zero repercussions even when his children fall into poverty. Both the Islamic courts and the civil courts seem to fail to make an example out of these men by not enforcing any legal consequences of child abandonment. 

Moreover, by remaining silent, society is low-key advocating acceptance and normalisation of such behaviour. No one shuns the father for abandoning his children just because he divorced their mother. However, if a woman ever leaves the child behind when she leaves a marriage, rumours and disdain will follow her to the ends of the earth. By allowing people to get away scot-free from abandoning their parental responsibilities, we are creating a never-ending cycle of failed marriages, single parenthood and stories of childhood abandonment.