According to the latest Kenya demographic and health survey report, there are more women than men infected by the HIV/Aids virus. The report puts women's infection rate at 8.7 per cent and that of men at 4.3 per cent. Further, the proportion of women who are HIV-positive has risen with age, from four per cent among 15-19 year olds to 12 per cent in the 25-29 age group. It stabilises among those aged between 25 and 39 years before falling to five per cent in the 45-49 age group.

Kenya's fertility rate is among the lowest in sub-Saharan Africa, a survey shows. The fertility rate stands at one woman giving birth to five children. This means that a Kenyan woman who is at the beginning of her childbearing age will give birth to five children by the end of her reproductive life if the fertility levels remain constant.

The East African Standard has investigated trafficking in children and babies in Kenya. The Standard investigation team infiltrated the Nairobi operations of a syndicate operating in cahoots with a few unscrupulous staff of the largest maternity hospital in the country - Pumwani Maternity Hospital in Nairobi's Eastlands. The baby thieves steal new-borns then present the new mothers with a body and inform them that their baby died shortly after birth. Clients for new-born babies, the investigations established, include well to do women unable to conceive, street women posing as poverty-stricken new mothers, jealous relatives and Satanists.

Human rights campaigners in Kenya have accused government of ignoring the plight of pastoral communities that are involved in a compensation case against the British government. In 2000, Maasai and Samburu pastoralists living in the northern Samburu and Laikipia districts sued Britain’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) for injuries caused by military ordnances left behind by its troops. The forces had been conducting exercises in these areas.

A Kenyan judge on Wednesday ordered the Kenyan government and Nyumbani Home - the oldest and largest AIDS orphanage in the country - to develop an agreement that would allow HIV-positive children from the orphanage to be admitted to area primary schools, the AP/Yahoo! News reported. Nyumbani on Wednesday sought a court order against the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology and the attorney general's office to force state schools to admit HIV-positive children, Nyumbani attorney Ababu Namwamba said.

Marking the New Year by calling attention to the immediate needs of children in developing countries, UNICEF named the top five concerns for children in 2004: child survival, the effects of HIV/AIDS, children caught in war, exploitation, and insufficient investment. "Each of these issues alone poses heartbreaking challenges for hundreds of millions of children," said UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy. "Together, they represent a global imperative to do more for children in 2004."

Preliminary findings from a government survey show that Kenya may have a lower HIV prevalence rate than previously thought - 6.7 percent compared to a 2003 Health Ministry estimate of 9.4 percent.

Under Kenya’s current constitution, drafted during the colonial era, the president enjoys extensive powers. To reduce these powers - which have sometimes been abused - some Kenyans have called for the current process of constitutional review to allow for the post of Prime Minister. But, others disagree. "There are those around the president who are enjoying power because of their close ties with him. They are opposed to the completion of the constitution review process," says Njeru Gathangu, chairperson of Citizens for Justice, a Nairobi-based pressure group which has been lobbying for a new constitution.

As Kenya enters 2004, it appears likely that the country's education system will come under increased scrutiny. Many teachers want the current syllabus to be overhauled, saying it places undue pressure on staff and children alike. At present, students undergo eight years of primary education, four years in secondary school and an additional four years at university. This constitutes the so-called ”8-4-4” system, which has been in place for nearly 15 years.

Investigators tracking the plunder of Kenya's resources during the regime of former President Daniel arap Moi have discovered that between $1 billion and $4 billion were shipped abroad illegally. The man leading the investigation said Wednesday that the goal of the probe was to retrieve as much as possible. "We have reached a stage where the Kenyan people have a right to know that this is an issue that we are taking extremely seriously, and to which we are applying the very best resources available,'' John Githongo, permanent presidential secretary for ethics and governance, told The Associated Press.

The Universities Academic Staff Union (Uasu) has allowed its branches to negotiate with their university councils over a pay stand-off but insisted only national officials would call off the strike. The union said the strike - now in its second month - could only be called off after members were satisfied over "new salaries the Government will offer".

A New Domestic Relations Bill under debate in parliament is generating intense debate, with a section of the public accusing the government of trying to interfere with their freedom in order to garner support from women in the 2006 elections. The Bill proposes that, for a man to marry a second wife, he must get the consent of the first wife and approval from district councils.

Sixty per cent of Nairobi’s two million inhabitants live in informal settlements. Kibera, home to around 700,000 people, is the largest of these. It is very overcrowded, and littered with rubbish. As it is an illegal settlement, the government provides no basic services. In the poorest areas of Nairobi, Kenya, the demands of parents have encouraged the new government to abolish fees in public schools. An Oxfam programme has also recognised that gender equitable education means more than access, and is attempting to address the specific problems which girls face.

In the shade of an acacia tree, a cluster of Kenyan women work busily, weaving baskets from sisal plant fibres. Their children are learning in a nearby schoolhouse. The school fees are paid by the money the mothers make from selling their baskets. Mary Masika, a widowed mother of seven, learned to weave sisal baskets from her mother. Now her weaving group is a part of the Machakos District Cooperative Union (MDCU), a union of artisan groups that market their products through the LWR Handcraft Project.

The illegal gains allegedly generated by Goldenberg International could have paid for universal primary education in Kenya for a decade. So one expert witness claimed at a public inquiry that has driven home to Kenyans the price they have paid for mismanagement. Goldenberg was set up at the turn of the 1990s, allegedly as a vehicle to access pre-shipment financing and state compensation for gold and jewellery exports.

“Yes, Kenyans are celebrating forty years of self-rule, while the Ogiek are remembering the forty years of dispossession and institutional marginalisation of being rendered homeless and a lack of identity in their natural habitat. Safe to say while the majority of Kenyans are yearning for the economic and political recovery, the Ogiek are begging for recognised domicile. The Environment Minister is planning mass eviction, the beneficiaries will go back to their homes of nativity, the Ogiek might be forced to join the street families.” says this statement in support of the Ogiek.

Corruption does not only mean the illegal looting of public funds. It can also include exorbitant salaries paid to the political leadership and the civil service, argues Dagi Kimani from The East African in an article for World Press Review. "As Kenyans this year launch a concerted war against corruption, which in governance is taken basically to mean the privatisation of public funds through illegal means, they will also have to fight extremely hard to stop the looting of public coffers in legal ways. This must be so because, in what looks like a conspiracy by the top echelons of the political leadership and the civil service, the salaries of top public servants are being pushed to obscene levels, even as lower cadres are perennially told that the exchequer does not have enough tax shillings to throw them a lifeline of single-digit percentage wage increase," the article says.

Established in June 2002, the Binti Pamoja Centre is designed to create a safe space for girls and young women to discuss reproductive health issues and to address problems such as gender discrimination, domestic abuse, and rape. Located in the low-income area of Kibera, Nairobi, Kenya, the Centre uses group discussion, art, and photography to enable young participants to speak out about - and, ultimately, effect social change related to - difficult issues.

Two Kenyan fishers land their canoe on the edge of Lake Naivasha, tipping their silver catch on the grass under the eager eyes of their employer. The meagre haul of 20 bass - worth 800 shillings ($10) - is a far cry from what fishers working for Stanley Mungai would have netted a few years back. Mungai, like many living near the shore, blames the environmental impact of 30 or so flower farms that have been set up around the lake in the past decade.

Government hospitals have been told to treat malaria and TB patients free of charge. Only children below five years have previously been eligible for the service. Health minister Charity Ngilu directed that the new guidelines be enforced without delay and warned defiant doctors that they risked being sacked.