A 14-year-old girl from Kilifi county made chilling revelations of how she was traded off to a 65-year-old white man by her father for a house.
Aisha (not her real name), narrated her ordeal after she was rescued by Okoa Sasa, an NGO that acts as a rescue center for children that have been sexually abused in Mombasa and its environs.
“I had just been sent home from school over a fee balance and my father said he did not have any money. Two months later, I was still at home,” she narrated.
Despite his claims of financial constraints, the father suddenly embarked on a house building project that left her confused.
It later turned out that he had negotiated for her bride price with a 65-year-old westerner and was using his new found cash to build himself a house.
“Even before I could completely absorb what was going on, we got married in accordance to Islamic rites,” she narrated.
The young girl went on to reveal gory details of distasteful acts she went through to her grandmother, who then alerted Okoa Sasa, leading to her rescue.
“I do not understand why my own father gave me away to an old man,” a sad Aisha explained.
Her story is just one among hundreds of similar narratives in the coastal towns, where the sex trade involving minors has taken an upturn.
Grace Odembo of Okoa Sasa affirmed that sex tourism is currently affecting both girls and boys, further adding that families have failed their children by offering them to tourists in exchange for money and other goodies.
She urged the government to carry out a proper vetting of foreigners who come in posing as investors and charitable donors, and that sex offense suspects face immediate deportation.