How men force women to abort

That men who have sex without protection and later request, manipulate, force, and even fund women to abort are the same ones who make laws that criminalise the termination of pregnancies, must rank as one of the greatest ironies of our time.

Lately, traditional men have been known to force their wives to go for ultrasound scans, then force them to abort if the baby is not a boy.

Rita Mwali, a city nurse, says that her sister aborted three times before she finally gave birth to a baby boy.

“Her husband was not happy that my sister kept giving birth to girls. After the third girl child, he became violent. He even made her abort three times when she was on her second trimester. She was too scared to leave him because our parents were not happy that she dropped out of college to get married,” Rita told The Nairobian, adding that her sister finally developed complications and died after the fourth abortion.

Research on unwanted pregnancies rarely looks at the role of men, notes Prof Charles Nzioka in Willing Fathers, Reluctant Parents: Young Men’s Perspectives on Unwanted Pregnancies and Abortion in Kenya.

“Such studies appear to assume that pregnancies are the sole responsibility of women, yet the men responsible have a critical role to play in the management of pregnancies,” writes the sociologist who lectures in among others, medical sociology, at the University of Nairobi.

Loose, careless, prostitutes                                                                     

It is men who complain loudest, labelling women who abort as ‘loose, careless, prostitutes.’

But with statistics from the Ministry of Health indicating that the 460,000 abortions in Kenya contribute to 20 per cent of maternal deaths, they are practically hanging women and getting away with murder.

Prof Nzioka found that “young men appear to admit to fatherhood, but few are ready to accept parenthood due to the heavy responsibility associated with parenting.”

The study also revealed that men viewed such sexual partners with ‘blemished eyes’ as most young men terminate their relationships with a woman who aborts. This is besides the trauma and high levels of stress for helping procure an abortion.

“Men push women to abort by rejecting responsibility. They also blackmail insecure women to terminate their pregnancies if the relationships are to continue,” says Moi University socio-anthropologist, Prof Paul Omondi. The professor notes that poor women are more vulnerable and easier to pressurise.

While it is common to hear men dismissing a woman saying, “That one has aborted six times,” what is rarely acknowledged is that the average man walking down the street has lost at least one ‘child’ through abortion.

An informal survey by these writers revealed that there are Nairobi men who have funded up to seven abortions. “My friend started dating his wife at a very tender age. He got her pregnant thrice but she aborted. We later learnt that she was helped by her mother who also pressured him to finance the abortion,” media practitioner Alex Mihango told us.

Despite three abortions and her family’s protestations, Alex explains that his friend still went on to marry her off and they now have children together.

“He started dating a different girl for awhile and we all hoped that he would marry her, but instead, he went back to the same lady and made her pregnant again. She aborted once more! Eventually, they tied the knot recently and have three children. I really can’t explain what those abortions were all about,” Mihango says.

She was lucky. Loise Kanana says that her boyfriend forced her to abort a number of times but dumped her after nine years of dating.

“He paid for my tuition and I’m thankful that he shaped my life to what it is at the moment. But I feel betrayed because he left me and settled down with another woman after dating her for only four months. They had a child before their first anniversary. I have never understood why he did that to me,” a bitter Loise who works as a receptionist for a city firm told us.

Married more affected

Prof Omondi says married men are more likely to fund or force their girlfriends to abort to hide illegitimate affairs or avoid paying child support. Single men also cajole girlfriends they are not serious about to abort.

“My girlfriend got pregnant but I wasn’t sure how I really felt about her. I told her to get an abortion. I did not want baggage because I knew she would bug me for monetary support,” said Anderson Odhiambo, a city chef.

Dismas Baraza, a city businessman, however says that not all men are to blame, since some wives and girlfriends conceal pregnancies and abort secretly. “A few years ago, a female friend borrowed money from me claiming she had some urgent issue to attend to. Little did I know that she was going to abort. A day later, I received a phone call from the hospital telling me that she almost died from the abortion.

“Apparently, she had filled my name as her next of kin. Relieved that she had survived, I rushed to the bar and had two beers!” Dismas said.

Prof Omondi says this happens when the priorities of the woman are not the same as those of her man.

“Alternatively, since the child is an everlasting tie between a man and a woman, when a woman does not see a future with a certain man, she could terminate the pregnancy. There are also women who suspect the man will not be there for them and the baby, so they abort to save themselves the s