Ho-ho-no! Housewife duties cook up inequality during Christmas

We meet Grace and her children in the wee hours leaving their one-bedroom house at Mlango Kubwa, Mathare in Nairobi. It is 5.30am and the city is slowly coming to life. First, she drops her children at school and heads out to Garissa Lodge in Eastleigh where she works as a matatu (public service vehicle) tout.

She, like many other Kenyan women, juggles work and unpaid care work which include food preparation, dishwashing, cleaning, childcare and laundry, among other household duties.

As passengers trickle into the 33-seater-bus, Grace tells us how she manages being a tout and a mother of two young children.

“I wake up at 4.30 am to prepare my husband and children for the day. To save time, I make tea the previous night and warm it in the morning for my children. I also pack leftover supper for my three-year-old-son to have for lunch at day-care,’’ she says.

Slow day

“Since I work as late as 10pm, I leave the house keys at a safe location only known to my children and I so that when my firstborn son gets home from school, he can let himself into the house. He knows that he is supposed to take a shower, warm himself a plate of food and sleep while he waits for me to get back home. Sometimes, our neighbour will check on him,’’ the 23-year-old says.

However, for her youngest son, Grace has to pick him up at 8pm from day-care because he is too young to go home on his own.

“On a slow day, I spend a lot of time on the road to make my daily keep of Sh800. On such days, I do not cook for my family but buy cooked food from vendors in the neighbourhood,’’ she shares.

In the afternoon when there are few passengers, the mother of two goes home for an hour to prepare supper for her children.

No help

“I usually leave the matatu in the loading queue at Garissa Lodge while I rush home to cook. Sometimes I go to my son’s day-care and replace the cold food he had carried in the morning with warm food. I also wash my children’s uniforms at this time because they only have two pairs,’’ Grace says.

Sometimes, her husband, who is a mason, helps with the children by taking them to school in the morning.

Grace wishes she could afford to hire help so that her children don’t have to wake up so early or stay at day-care for so long.

“When I'm at work, I think about my children a lot, especially about my youngest child. Has he eaten? Is my other son safe at home alone? Are they hurt, sick or crying? I just need more time and money,’’ she says

On the other side of town, Nation.Africa we meet Portia Karani-Murimi, an accountant who works in the development space. She is a mother of three boys aged 12,10 and five. She counts herself lucky because she has a hybrid working arrangement which entitles her to 10 work- from-home days a month.

“On days I am going to the office, I wake up at 6am to get ready for work. I have delegated the responsibility of getting the boys ready for school to my nanny. I live in Syokimau, which has access to the expressway so it takes me about half an hour to get to work,’’ she says.

Since she is most productive in the morning, Portia does most of her work at that time. This includes having meetings, responding to emails and preparing financial reports.

“Lunch hour is very sacred in our office. I use the time to connect with mature women colleagues and have conversations on topics like family, finances and politics. This is also the time I meet with my mentee to catch up with them,’’ she shares.

The mother of three rarely gets phone calls from her nanny during the day because she has set up systems that can function without her presence. She also credits having a seamless day to her organisation skills. The only time she interrupts her work is when any of the children is sick.

“I believe women should delegate because we have so many responsibilities as working mothers. It is even biblical!  Even Sarah had Haggai. For the holidays, when I don't have help, we split household tasks amongst every member of our family. For example, my first born can cook breakfast, the second born does dishes and I cook. Sometimes my husband makes breakfast before he leaves for work,’’ Portia adds.

Family members

As families gather to celebrate Christmas and New Year holidays, women’s burden of unpaid labour increases exponentially. This is because in most cases, it is the women, both in the rural and urban areas who are left to take up the extra burden of catering for the increased number of family members.

For instance, Linet Mbethi, who travelled from Nairobi to Machakos for Christmas, says she is always prepared to do a lot of domestic work during the holidays.

“There are a lot of house chores here (Machakos) because there are many family members to be cared for and my mother is also sick. I still have to wake up at 6am as I do in the city so that I can do all the chores in good time. Some tasks like preparing meals take longer because we use firewood to cook. I also sleep earlier because I get very tired,’’ Linet shares.

Dudley Muchiri, 26, acknowledges that the world is changing even though men were not raised to perform any form of unpaid labour.

“If I had a working wife, I know that we would have to share responsibilities, both financially and in the house. I am open to assisting her with house chores and taking care of the children. There is value in taking care of one's family,’’ Mr Muchiri says.

However, he acknowledges that doing so in his rural home may be difficult even if he wanted to. This is because he will be ridiculed by both male and female relatives for not being ‘man enough’.

On the other hand, Nick Mwirigi, rarely thinks about domestic work because his wife manages their household with the help of a maid. He has also never been socialised to do any house chores so it does not occur to him to perform any.

“My wife actually wakes up earlier than me because she has to make sure the house is tidy and breakfast is ready for the family. I appreciate the work she does because when I was single, I had to pay someone to keep my house clean,’’ he states.

Indeed, the recently released 2021 Kenya Time Use Report shows that women spend an average of four hours and 30 minutes a day on unpaid care and domestic work such as food preparation, dishwashing, cleaning, childcare and laundry, while men only spend 54 minutes on the same. This means women spend about seven times more time on unpaid care work compared to men.

Read also: Men spend more time on self-care activities than women, KNBS report

According to gender expert Jane Godia, patriarchal societies do not see unpaid work as valuable work even though if such work was economically evaluated, it would cost a lot of money.

She adds the implication of such a burden makes women and girls miss out on opportunities that would empower them economically.

“In most African families, even a girl child is withdrawn from school to offer care work in circumstances where there is no other adult woman. Withdrawing a girl from school lessens her opportunity to be able to work in high income earning environments. She ends up being among the poor for lack of education,’’ she reiterates.

Her assertions are corroborated by Oxfam's report Reducing Inequality Index 2022, which found that a young woman today is likely to work four years more than a man even though it is estimated that she will earn 24 per cent less than the man.

Going forward, Ms Godia suggests that the government must put in place strategies that recognise such unpaid labour as available work.

“Care work must be factored into the national budget and this means that all national budgets should be gender responsive. There must be labour policies that guide how people work including how they are remunerated for their efforts without one being discriminated against because of their gender. Employment acts must also be gender responsive,’’ she states.

This is what the Principal Secretary for Gender Affairs and Affirmative Action Anne Wang’ombe alluded to during the launch of the 2021 Time Use Report this October. She revealed that the Ministry of Gender was developing a national care policy.

“The National Care Policy will go through public participation, cabinet review and finally parliamentary approval. Its launch will inform micro and macro-economic and social protection policies that give consideration to women’s unpaid labour,’’ Ms Wang’ombe said.

Ms Godia explains why a care policy is crucial in compensating women for unpaid care.

“A national care policy is an accountability document that provides standards, guidelines and procedures on how things should be done and by whom. If this is set in place and fully implemented with proper guidelines and a budget, then the women who offer care work will be documented and registered. They will then be adequately catered for by the government,’’ she elaborates.

Other than the possibility of a care policy, the Kenyan law also recognises the value of unpaid labour in the division of matrimonial property when a marriage comes to an end. Section two of The Matrimonial property Act 2013, states that contribution includes monetary and non-monetary contribution.

Family business

Elizabeth Musikali, an advocate and law lecturer at Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA) explains what non-monetary contribution is.

“This means that when dividing property between a husband and wife, the courts will consider non-monetary contribution such as domestic work and management of the matrimonial home, child care, companionship, management of family business or property and farm work,’’ Ms Musikali says.

However, she reiterates that it is not enough for women to simply state that they performed unpaid labour.

“You must prove significant contribution, for instance, if a woman quit her job to raise children so that her husband can comfortably concentrate on work, or the woman forfeited her high-paying career for a less demanding job to take care of the family while her husband works,’’ she clarifies.

She believes that the law looks kindly towards the woman by recognising the value of unpaid labour. However, it is still not clear-cut and every matter is determined on a case-to-case basis.

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