By Margaret Nyambura and Hortense Minishi
Hon. Onyango was the first woman in Kenya to be elected to the National Assembly. For close to five decades, barely 50 women were elected to such positions. Kenya’s 2010 Constitution changed this trajectory. Prior to Grace Onyango’s trailblazing election in 1969, women’s representation in Kenya’s Parliament remained strikingly low and marginalized.
Now marking its 15th year, the Constitution has guaranteed a minimum of 47 women elected to the National Assembly in every election cycle- so far standing at three cycles, with additional women joining through other constitutional provisions including inter-alia equality and non- discrimination clauses, reserved seats for women and the requirement on the two thirds gender rule. This shift has not only expanded women’s political voice but also reshaped national debates, placing health, equity, and the lived realities of women and families at the centre of parliamentary discourse…
