Uhuru, Museveni one-stop border post drain business from sex workers

Busia Survivors programmes manager Carolyne Kemunto and other sex workers address the media on their low business [Ignatius Odanga, Standard]

Commercial sex workers in Busia have decried low returns from their trade due to the one-stop Border Post President Uhuru Kenyatta and his Ugandan counterpart commissioned last weekend.

Most of the agents who worked in Clearing and Forwarding companies in Busia Kenya have crossed over to Uganda which they say has better opportunities.

The infamous Nalongo in Uganda has also taken away their clients.

Busia Survivors (a self-help group for the sex workers) programmes manager Carolyne Kemunto intimated to the media that they were undergoing difficult times.

The group at met at the County Referral Hospital where they had gone to clean the facility as they marked International Sex Workers Rights Day.

"Most of our clients have disappeared to Uganda because services there are too cheap especially at Nalongo and this has affected as seriously," said Kemunto.

There are more than 3,000 commercial sex workers in Busia and over 1,000 homosexuals. They also lamented that stigma against them at home and in hospitals was still rife.

Kemunto asked the government not to criminalize commercial sex since some people depend on to feed their family and educate their children.

She refuted the perception that those under Busia survivors were all HIV positive.

"Some are negative and we always encourage them to protect themselves when they get client," said Kemunto.

Bench Mawazo, a popular spot where sex workers camp to look for clients has seen its star go dim.

Bernard Wabwire, a homosexual said they are forced to cross to Uganda to look for customers.    

Previous data has shown Busia and Malaba as towns where prostitution is high due to long distance truck drivers.

According to the statistics that Health department released during World Aids Day early this month, Budalang'i topped in the county with HIV and Aids prevalence by 8.2 per cent, Matayos 8.0 per cent, Butula 7.7 per cent.

It also emerged that Busia was number four countrywide with high new HIV and Aids infection