A high school for girls in Kenya's Narok County is closed indefinitely after students walked out Tuesday to protest alleged sexual harassment by a staff member. Earlier this month, another school was closed after a teacher was accused of rape. The incidents have left the government scrambling to deal with the problem behind the protests.
Nearly 1,000 students were reported to have walked out of Maasai Girls High School at 4 a.m. local time Tuesday. Parents arriving at the school demanded immediate investigations into the matter.
Narok District Education board chair Samuel Sankale confirmed the incident and said authorities are taking action.
"We have decided to close the school," Sankale said, adding, "We are investigating a teacher who was forcing girls to love him, to have sexual intercourse with him."
More than a week earlier, a rape was reported at Moi Girls High School in Nairobi, forcing that school to be shut down as well. The school's executive board was disbanded by the cabinet secretary for education, Amina Mohammed.
Mohammed said the Education Ministry was concerned about the increased cases of sexual assault being reported from schools.
"I wish I could say conclusively that the safety of our children in schools as it should actually be is guaranteed," she said. "I cannot tell you that because these schools, as you know, are part of our society and, as you know, in all societies, things happen. Bad things actually happen. I think the saving grace is this: We have laws and those laws must be enforced when these bad things happen."
Police are also investigating an alleged attempted rape at a school in western Kenya. A man is said to have been hiding under a bed in a girls' dormitory, and escaped after being spotted by a school staff member.
Mohammed has appointed a team to develop a policy to address sexual abuse in schools.
"As a ministry of education, we are going to put policies in place, we are going to take measures that are necessary to ensure that the schools are as safe as they can be," she said. "But we all have to play our role — parents, teachers, neighbors, everybody — because, you know, it's not only happening in our schools. It's happening in our homes, it's happening in our neighborhoods, it's happening everywhere."
