EXPLAINED | Kenyan senator asked to leave over ‘period stain’: How prevalent is the period taboo?

Furoreover menstruation and the taboo surrounding it is not an issue of the past. In the latest, afemale senator from Kenya who was forced to leave the chamber due to what seemed to be a period stain on her pants told the BBC that she was proud of herself for speaking out against "period shame". Gloria Orwoba is waging a determined battle against the shame associated with menstruation.

What exactly happened at the Kenyan Parliament?

Gloria Orwoba noticed that she had a period stain on her pants before she entered the Kenyan Parliament. She has longbeen striving to eliminate period-related stigma and felt that the moment was right to make a statement. When she walked into the parliament in her blood-stained pants, her fellow senators frowned upon herand felt that Orwobawas being disrespectful to the parliament.What soon followed was a request to leave the room.

Several senators, including female senators, are now criticising Orwobafor her move.

Orwoba, in the opinion of Senator Tabitha Mutinda, was disrespectful and inappropriate. At a plenary session, she questioned the speaker about whether Orwoba had adhered to the dress code.

“You don’t understand if she’s on the normal woman cycle or she’s faking it, and it is so indecent,” said Mutinda, according to a report in theBBC. The MP said that Orwoba was setting a bad example for girls and young women in Kenya.

Orwoba said that it was “an accident that is natural.”

“I have stained my clothes and at the end of the day I just want to know while we are discussing this issue that is not in the order paper, is it because senators are not women who have periods,” she asked.

Amason Kingi, the speaker, shared the majority's viewpoint and asked Orwoba to leave. He claimed that a woman is supposed to behave in a certain way while she is on her period. He asserted that Orwoba was not the target of discrimination and expressed sympathy for her situation.

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“Having periods is never a crime,” he said. Yet he directed her to leave and come back with clothes that are not stained, reportsThe Standard,a Kenyan newspaper.

What wasGloria Orwoba's reaction?

Orwoba refused to be humiliated. She left the parliament building in the same set of clothes and went straight to a school in Nairobi whereshe handedout sanitary napkins to female students.

Kenyan senator Gloria Orwoba was asked to leave Parliament because her pants had period stains. Photo credits: Twitter/Mac Otani

Orwoba has been diligently working to eradicate period poverty and the stigma attached to menstruation. As per local reports, she supported a resolution for the government to enhance financing for free sanitary pads and menstrual health-related hygiene goods at all public schools across the nation.

Period stigma in Kenya

Period shame made headlines in Kenya in 2019 when a 14-year-old schoolgirl died by suicide.The girl was founddead in Kabiangek, west of Nairobi, in September 2019. The reason behindher drastic step was a period stain.A report in The Guardian said that the teacher had dismissed her from class after calling her dirty.

That was the teen's first period, and she didn't have access to a sanitary pad, her mother subsequently revealed to the media.

A 2017 regulation requiring the Kenyan government to provide sanitary napkins to all schoolgirls was called into question as a result of the tragedy.

Soon after, women's rights activists in Kenya erupted in rage, yet nothing has changed on the ground.

Kenya has taken action in the past to address the menstrual hygiene issue. The 2017 law mandates that all schoolgirls get free sanitary pads. Every girl enrolled in school must receive "free, sufficient, and quality sanitary towels," and it planned to offer a "safe and environmentally sound system for disposal".

The nation eliminated its tariff on menstruation products in 2004. Although it seems promising on paper, the truth is very different.

According to the World Bank, 95 per cent of menstruatinggirls in Kenya missed one to three school days, 70 per cent said it had a negative effect on their grades, and more than 50 per cent said they had fallen behind in their studies as a result.

Global stigma surrounding period: What does the data say?

Half of the schools in low-income nations lack the adequate water, sanitation, and hygiene services that girls and female teachers need to manage menstruation as per a 2015 UNICEF report. Several studies argue that insufficient sanitary facilities negatively impact girls' educational experiences by forcing them to skip class when having their periods or even drop out.

In India, a meta-analysis on the condition of menstrual hygiene among adolescent girls discovered that a quarter of the girls skipped school during menstruation due to inadequate toilet facilities.

Even though the government had declared this practise to be forbidden, a study in Nepal discovered that many girls were still made to sleep in the fields or in huts when they were on their period, as per a World Bank report.

Similarly,a survey conducted in Egypt found that manyschoolgirls said that they avoid taking a bath during their period since it is socially unacceptable to do so.

In a 2018 poll of 1,500 women and men in the United States, The New York Post found that 58 per cent of women have experienced a sense of embarrassment merely because they were on their period.

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