Kericho County played host to First ever (Inaugural) Governors Gender Round Table (GGRT). The Governor of Kericho, H.E. Prof. Chepkwony is the chair of Gender Committee among other committees of Governors. Kericho has six (6) sub-counties namely, Kipkelion West, Kipkelion East, Belgut, Ainamoi, Soin/ Sigowet, and Bureti constituencies. Kericho County has 30 Administrative Wards. Kericho is home of tea and hosts to multinational companies such as Williamson and Uniliver.  Kericho has numerous indigenous companies trading in Tea products.

PRESENTATIONS BY KEY INVITED GUESTS

Daisy Amdany- Chair of National Women Steering Committee

First by thanking the Governor of Kericho for taking the first step to host the first ever such kind of Governors Gender Round Table, Daisy, In her inaugural speech at the Launch of Governors Gender Round Table (GGRT), she noted that “Today is a key milestone –celebrating women, youth and people with disability. It marks a decisive efforts to ensure inclusion, participation of the marginalised into mainstream development discourse.

The national Women Steering Committee has national networks that permit wider reach. Our objective is to amplify the women’s voices and create platforms for women engagement with duty bearers. Its core business is in four thematic areas namely: Trade and Economic Empowerment of women, youth and PWDs, Leadership development for elective representatives; that focuses on accountability and strengthening peoples voices in development, The third area is Agriculture and lastly fourth is Health.

She reiterated the need for citizen participation and making devolution work for the citizen.

She emphasised the fact that numerous planning meetings have taken place between development partners, NWSC and Council of Governors (CoG) to make this day successful.

By the leaders present adopting the GGRTs, it sets in motion an implementation mechanism that has a robust structure of engagement between citizens and duty bearers.

The approaches to engagement will involve:

• Bringing together local community members in meetings where they will first identify key challenges, ideas and priorities within their wards. The method of engagement at the meeting should be participatory in nature using reflect approach.
• Secondly, the members will negotiate on a best mechanism to address the issues identified and bring them to the attention of the County assembly (CA) and the executive i.e. Governors in an effort to influence policy formulation, planning and resource allocation.
• The community members will then develop best practices and show case their results and work

Daisy applauded the Governors willingness to listen to Women, youth and people with disability and initiating the dialogue to make each county gender responsive under devolution. She noted that such leadership will realise the dreams and aspiration of the marginalised in society toward an inclusive and progressive gender agenda in the country.

Lastly, Daisy introduced members of the national steering Committee present and highlighted the works of NWSC and its core mandate and objectives.

She thanked all present and recognized the critical role played by Rose Ruto who played a key role in mobilizing and organizing logistics on the ground.

She thanked the development partners present for their continued commitment on gender, governance and Devolution, without their support we in Kenya could not have achieved such significant milestones.