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8 Women Every Week: What Kenya's Most Recent Femicide Data Actually Shows

The government stopped publishing consolidated data in March 2025. We have kept counting. Here is what 2026 looks like so far — and why the age profile should alarm every university in Kenya.

In March 2025, the Government of Kenya stopped publicly releasing consolidated femicide data. The Silencing Women Project did not stop. Odipo Dev did not stop. Africa Data Hub did not stop. And neither did the killings.

Women killed per week nationally (Amnesty 2026)

1,069

Documented since 2016 (SWP database)

Classified as femicide in Kenyan law

2024

Deadliest year on record, per SWP lead researcher

The Scale in 2026

Amnesty International Kenya documented 8 femicides per week nationally in 2026 — more than one per day. FIDA-Kenya recorded 70 weekly GBV cases across its three offices in the same period, half linked to intimate partner violence. The government figure, had one been published, would almost certainly be higher: the SWP database covers primarily English-language media, which structurally undercounts rural and non-anglophone cases.

The 1,069 figure — women documented killed since 2016 — is a floor, not a ceiling. The Silencing Women Project is explicit: 78% of the documented cases meet the UNODC definition of femicide. The rest die in the statistical gap between 'murder' and a crime Kenya does not legally recognise.

Who Is Dying: The Age Profile

Women aged 18–35 account for 65% of all femicide victims — the highest share since 2021. The most common age cluster is the mid-twenties. University and college students are significantly represented.

This is not a crisis of older women in long-term marriages, though those cases exist. It is concentrated in the years when women are most socially mobile — completing education, entering the workforce, forming and ending relationships. Campus safety campaigns are necessary. They are not sufficient. The risk is intimate, not institutional.

Who Is Killing: The Perpetrator Profile

80%

Killed by a current or former intimate partner

40%

Husbands — the single largest perpetrator category

77%

Killed by someone known to the victim

The home is the primary site of lethal GBV risk. Not a dark street, not a stranger. A husband, a boyfriend, a former partner. This is consistent with global femicide data and with every study done in Kenya. It means that the standard public safety response — street lighting, transport safety, campus patrols — addresses a small fraction of the risk profile.

The policy implication is stark: if 80% of femicide is intimate partner violence, then the P3 form fee, the ODPP case-load, and the culture of non-prosecution are not peripheral issues. They are the central ones. Remove the KES 1,500 P3 barrier and you do more for femicide prevention than any public safety campaign.

The Silence Is a Policy Choice

The government stopped publishing consolidated femicide data in March 2025 — 68+ weeks before the time of writing. This is not an administrative gap. Silencing Women Project lead researcher Patricia Andago has said on record that 2024 was the deadliest year on record for Kenyan women. The decision to suppress that data in its aftermath is a documented accountability failure.

Dada Labs will keep publishing. The Africa Data Hub dataset is public. The methodology is open. The accountability is permanent.

Sources