Female MP with baby ordered to leave Kenyan parliament as ‘strangers’ not allowed in

‘I have tried really hard not to come with the baby but today I had an emergency,’ says Zuleika Hassan

Woman MPs have walked out of Kenya’s parliament to show solidarity with a colleague who was ordered to leave because she had taken her five-month-old baby with her.

Zuleika Hassan said she had been forced to bring her child to work due to a domestic emergency and said that the parliament did not have a creche.

However, the house rules stipulate “strangers” are not allowed into the chamber – with children included in this definition.

Although a bill was passed in 2017 to have breastfeeding and changing rooms available in workplaces, there are still none in Kenya’s parliament.

Ms Hassan urged parliament to create a more “family friendly atmosphere” if it wants more women to become MPs.

“I have tried really hard not to come with the baby but today I had an emergency – what was I supposed to do?” Ms Hassan told her colleagues.

“If parliament had a nursery or a creche, I would be able to put my baby there.”

The incident sparked outrage among male colleagues who branded her actions shameful.

Speaker Christopher Omulele ordered Ms Hassan out of the chamber, and said she could return without the baby.

Some MPs shouted and others began shoving each other.

Deputy speaker Moses Cheboi said in a statement that parliament has a facility for mothers to nurse their babies.

But mothers have to “bring along their nannies to watch over the babies at the facility while they undertake their official duties”.

The incident happened as World Breastfeeding Week, an annual celebration held in more than 120 countries, came to an end but during which saw several woman politicians around the world photographed taking their babies to work.

A Danish politician was ejected from parliament for bringing her five-month-old daughter into the chamber in March.

The move sparked shock in the Scandinavian country, which is often heralded as a champion of women’s rights, with a report finding it the best country in the world for women to live in.

“You are not welcome with your baby in the parliament’s chamber,” Pia Kjaersgaard, the speaker who is a former leader of the right-wing Danish People’s Party, told Mette Abildgaard.

Ms Abildgaard, a Conservative Danish MP, responded to the furore by explaining it was the first time she had brought her daughter to work, as the baby’s father could not step in to look after her.

New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern made history by bringing her baby daughter into the United Nations assembly hall in September last year.

Ms Ardern, who gave birth while in office, could be seen playing with her three-month-old child before giving a speech at the Nelson Mandela peace summit in New York. Her partner, Clarke Gayford, held the baby on his lap while the world leader addressed the UN’s General Assembly.

Footage of Canadian minister Karina Gould breastfeeding her son in parliament went viral last year. And in 2016, an Icelandic politician made headlines after breastfeeding her six-week-old infant while speaking at the podium in parliament.