Kenya - Jane Muthoni Getonga - 2000 Graduate

Jane Muthoni Getonga

Anglican Development Services of Mt. Kenya East

Graduate Impact Study site visit, April 2014

by Steven Cutting

(Jane passed away suddenly in December of 2018)

“A rural leader is a kind of simple leader. There should be no gap between you and the people you are leading. Although you have different responsibilities, you should be seen as one.”

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Jane

In 1998 Jane applied for a scholarship to go to ARI from the National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK). At the time of her interview she was pregnant with her second son and was asked, “How are you going to make it in Japan for a one year study? We can see you are too expectant.” Jane replied, “Pregnancy is not a disability,” and all the women on the panel clapped. Fortunately, the scholarship was granted and deferred for a year so that she could breastfeed her baby and Jane started at ARI in April 2000. This is one example among many of the difficulties women from conservative cultures face as they seek opportunities for education or advancement such as ARI training.

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Entrance of Anglican Development Services, Mt. Kenya East, Mitunguu Station

Upon her return, Jane was highly motivated to start a poultry project. However, the Anglican Development Services (ADS) leadership feared such a project would fail because chickens are vulnerable to disease. Confident of her ability, she pursued her request and was finally given permission to try it on a small scale. “I brought in the first lot and they told me to bring only a lot of 50,” Jane shares. “And I said, ‘Let me start with what they are saying. I will show them.’ So that’s what I started. Up to today, that poultry project is the biggest project in this station. I have also extended it to the communities.” As for disease, it wasn’t a problem because her ARI training had taught her good hygiene in the pens by keeping them dry and she had also learned to vaccinate chicks herself, a skill which she has passed on to her staff and farmers. The communities like raising poultry because two cocks, which take six months to raise can be sold for almost the same price as a goat which takes three years. When Jane hears these stories she knows, “There is something positive I am doing for these people and that encourages me.”

She oversees a rabbit project and told of a boy who was given a set of babies which he raised and sold to buy a sheep and a pair of shoes. The sheep has provided two offspring and the shoes earned him the name “rabbit” by the other kids at school. Over the years ADS has reached 9,000 farmers in the Meru region and Jane feels the key is to go and be with the people in their own places with the approach that “Rural leadership is a kind of simple leader. There should be no gap between you and the people you are leading. Although you have different responsibilities, but you should be seen as one.”

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Transporting water – many Kenya households rely on water carried long distances

Jane is also in charge of the station health center. They conduct programs on HIV/AIDS and have formed a support group of people living with diabetes. On the issue of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) they collaborate with the Meru Council of Elders who work to change deeply rooted cultural attitudes regarding this practice. “We try to create awareness to them to hold on to the good values, and also to leave away retrogressive values.” Sadly, a few years ago, Jane had to have her leg amputated above the knee due to thrombosis and gangrene. Adjustment has not been easy, but her spirit for her work remains strong. It may take her a little longer to get where she is going, but she still goes, even to the most remote villages, to be with the people.

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