Women bear the brunt of drug abuse and that is why we have called this meeting today because we know the media can help in this fight. These were the sentiments expressed by Ms. Pamela Mburia of the Association of Media Women in Kenya, AMWIK as she opened a press conference where AMWIK was to make a statement on drug abuse and the resultant gender based violence.

Several other women's rights organisations were also present namely CREAW, Coalition on Violence Against Women- COVAW-KENYA, and Hon. Adelina Ndeto Mwau MP representing the Kenya Women parliamentarians.

Mburia in her opening remarks explained that AMWIK has long worked with the National Agency for the Campaign Against Drug Abuse (NACADA) and other women's rights organisations. She then invited the National Coordinator NACADA Mr Joseph Kaguthi to speak.

He explained to the gathered press representatives that they were trying to create an orchestra and if one part was not there we would fail in fighting drug abuse. Toady's event was an AMWIK initiative which he was very happy to support.

Kaguthi stated that the country was having problems because of our inability to stem adverts which are targeting the youth who cannot differentiate fact from fantasy.

Alcohol beverage manufacturers came in for a tongue lashing as Kaguthi declared that our biggest problem was alcohol and yet the multinationals were not sensitive to this. Nderemo Ya Mabingwa (a recently concluded countrywide Kenya Breweries competition) particularly came under fire.

We want to tell you if you did not know that this competition was targeted to the youth. Even last year "Nderemo ya mfalme" youth were stealing money to buy beer in order to get the bottle tops so that they could enter the competition and maybe win those big cars.

Crimes against person like rape were also a direct result of those who had been drinking alcohol and thus had lowered inhibitions. He gave an illustration of one young girls who "can simply not restructure her life" as she tries to run away from alcohol but every time she even puts on the radio there are advertisements exhorting her to drink alcohol.

So AMWIK we need your help as Kenya Breweries people have over 300 million shillings for advertising to hook new victims.

This he said was going against citizens human rights and that is why he was happy to see lawyers preset at today's function because they had taken to long to take up this issue. Figures available from 2003 he went on indicated that 49% of physical domestic violence against women was as a direct result of alcohol consumption.

The National Coordinator explained that when they had had a meeting with brewers and distiller's and asked them to tone down their advertisements one fellow from London Distillers said they cannot because you the media survive their advertisements.

So we are asking what are we saying is the choice here? The advertisement from Tiger, British American Tobacco, BAT, London Distillers or the children?

Turning the spotlight on the media Kaguthi appealed that there was a urgent need to address the issue of promotion because as the media you are being used to promote these drugs.

On her part Hon Adelina Mwau revealed that the country was in a big problem as far as alcohol and drug abuse were concerned reminding those present that as they had just heard over 40% of violence against women was at the hands of men who were drunk.

The MP revealed that alcohol and drug abuse was an issue very close to her heart stating categorically that she knew alcoholism was a disease. But yet there was a lot of denial in this country that alcoholism was a disease

Maybe it was also time that the 16 days of activism an annual event held by COVAW should this year look at the need to make alcohol an issue.

Mwau lamented that all the time she was in her constituency in Makueni whenever she talked about alcohol, the women were up in arms as they were really fighting it as it brought a lot of poverty.

In fact so regularly was she talking about alcoholism and drug abuse in Makueni that she had even been threatened. Men had been sent to tell her that if she wanted to survive she should stop talking about alcohol in parliament and on TV.

The MP expressed surprise that even the money which had previously been allocated to NACADA professionals had been cut by 80% yet NACADA was doing a good job going around schools.

Turning her guns on Kenya Breweries she said they had managed to make Tusker (beer) the only thing you have to drink to be a "mabingwa" (champion) and this mentality had to be fought because there were other ways of being mabingwa.

Alcohol was ruining families resulting in dysfunctional families, where there was no communication and the country was now ending up with Adult Children Of Alcoholics, ACOA's'.

The provincial administration in the form of the Chiefs and Sub-chiefs were not spared her sights either. These were the people responsible for encouraging brewing of illicit alcohol as this is where they received "their second salaries."

Worse still this alcohol was brewed under very unhygienic conditions with some even being brewed in toilets so as to get it to ferment faster while others had sisal juice or battery acid added to them.

The law also needed to be looked at as she wondered how we were allowing children to go into supermarkets to buy alcohol. Indeed in the village where she was and others opening a bar is considered to be the fastest way of making money and often bhang is being sold nearby and this too was another reason why she had been threatened. People wanted to get rich from alcohol and other drugs.

It had therefore become a personal and political issue with her because dealing with BAT and companies which were making sachets which were banned and have now come up with 250 ml ones for fourty shillings where you can still as young people share 10 shillings each and buy so thanks to AMWIK an NACADA for this press conference because we are not becoming but are a nation of alcoholics.

The focus now swung to Mrs Anne Njogu, Executive Director of CREAW who did not mince her words about rape saying that it was sad that nowadays hardly any crime was committed without rape.

Citing the example of a recent case all the females in the family were raped and the thugs even removed the diapers from a one-and-half year old baby just to ascertain the sex and when found that it was male threw it to the floor in disgust. Was this a normal person who would want to rape a one-and-a-half year old baby or somebody high on something? Carjackings were followed by rape.

Something had to be done and it could not be done only through say the church or any other single group. It had to be multi-sectoral while at the same time as a society we had to look at where we had gone wrong and if it was alcohol, we can look at it again.

"I am happy the media are here as the media is very important in this fight as the media can set the agenda." She appealed to the church "because 50% of your congregation are the abusers." The judiciary too gives very lenient sentences for crimes like rape so almost like saying that you can rape and get away with it.

She emphasised that society needed to stop making heroes of those who drank a lot concluding that "let us not wait for women to become rape statistics!"

Ms Grace Mbugua of the COVAW applauded the initiative as she told the horrified audience of a case they were handling in which a teacher had allegedly raped his student a young girl and when they called the police the police were reluctant and as a result the case has now changed to one of defamation with teachers saying she had just put tomato sauce to make it look like she had been raped. So teachers we need your help.

Elisa ?? the AMWIK Vice-Chair wound up with a press statement which in part read "it is a well documented fact that there is a very close link between the emerging cases of violence against women such as rape, defilement, and violent crime, to increased drug and substance abuse.

The panel then fielded questions from the journalists and one of the first was about the recently launched KBL responsible drinking campaign. The lady journalist asked whether 16 as breweries were saying was the legal age from which one could drink and the training of bar tenders not to serve to underage drinkers and those already drunk was a good initiative or just a publicity gimmick.

Mrs Njogu shot back that 16 was too young the legal age was 18 and that nevertheless all one had to do was to go to any bar and find children under the legal drinking age being sold alcohol.

Hon Mwau reminded the gathering that the approach to alcohol had to be looked at again because in traditional Kenyan society you could not drink at age 16 in fact in Ukambani where she came from women did not drink and men could only drink when they had a daughter of marriageable age.

Kaguthi had an entirely different take on the issue however vocally stating that "there is no such thing with alcohol as responsible drinking. Even my grandmother knew mlevi hana dini! (a drunkard has no religion)." He wondered why we are allowing these companies to create an alcohol culture in the country. Where he pondered were the professionals?

He pointed out that 100% Injecting Drug Users, IDU's' had started out with cigarettes.

In another question one journalist wondered why the media was being asked to do something which they were doing but that in all these campaigns Kenyans had not seen parental input. For if you 16 old is taking booze something is wrong with the foundation of his upbringing

The National Coordinator answered that in a survey they had done found that 80% of parents believed that the role of educating their children on issues to do with drugs primarily belonged to the teachers followed by the clergy. What then would happen he mused if the teacher was a "druggy" himself?

The Kenya Times newspaper reporter however wanted to know about the upcoming tobacco bill asking the MP if she was aware that there were plans under foot to sabotage the bill.

Hon Adelina Mwau allayed fears by saying that the motion had passed quiet well and many of them were determined to see it pass through though where bills involved money and other interests there was always controversy.

The Kenya Times journalist also asked the National Coordinator Joseph Kaguthi what is NACADA now doing beyond the campaign? to which the NC replied that a new term of reference had bee added.

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