BY NYASHA DUBE – They say when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Cliche right? Well, what if you have had one too many lemons thrown at you, how many wouldn’t throw in the towel, how many can still hold on and live to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
This is a story about Hope. A young woman, determined to change the narrative in a partriachal system. It is one thing experience the enforcement of male supremacy from the opposite sex, but to experience it from a fellow woman? Yet this has become a sad reality in most communities, a new normal where many social ills are committed against the girl child. What you are about to read might seem like an ordinary story, but it’s negative impact on the girl child is not something to be ignored.
Hope grew up in a small rural settlement. Being the eldest daughter in a polygamous family, she always dreamt of breaking out of the poverty chain. She wanted to pursue her education to the highest level possible, and ensure that her father’s legacy lives on. Hope’s mother, the first wife, had five daughters expecting the sixth, no son. She kept on giving birth hoping that one day she will have the much needed son. The father had to marry a second wife to give him an heir. Wife number two was only too happy to rub it in on wife number one, as she had two sons already, ready to be groomed into men who would take over the family when the father passed on.
Knowing the African context too well, Hope’s mother became a disgrace for having daughters only, and weird enough she took out her anger, frustration and resentment on her own daughters!
Few years later, Hope finished her primary school level, and was told she could not continue to High school. It was her Tete (father’s sister) who broke the news to her. “Why?”, she had asked. “Because you are a girl mwanangu. Very soon you will find a good man and get married. There’s no point in continuing with your education,” that was the response.
All Hope wanted was to acquire basic education. And hearing such words from her Tete was devastating, a woman who was supposed to protect her. She managed to have some local teachers convince her family and she went on to high school.
It was not easy for Hope. Her mother always reminded her how she was wasting resources, and how someone’s son would just come and take her away. Up until Hope passed her Ordinary level with flying colours. She was so happy, hoping that her parents would soon realise her potential and take her to college. She could already picture herself working at a big Corporate firm as an accountant. Finally, she would make her parents proud.
To her despair, her mother and Tete chose that very same moment to sit her down and tell her how she had grown to become a mature woman and apparently the chief’s son had asked for her hand in marriage. The parents were ready to accept the dowry. Yes, Hope’s parents were arranging her own marriage, and her consent did not matter.
How could they do this to her, she kept asking herself. Until one day it hit her. Partriachy has been normalised to a point where even women support it and overtly perpetrate it. Women have become so desperate to please their husbands that they sacrifice their daughters instead. We have women covering up rape and abuse of their daughters so they can keep their families intact.
What’s sad is that not all young girls and women can hold on like Hope, who later on realised her dreams. Some are consumed by the system, they end up with shattered dreams and broken souls.
Millicent Nhutsve, a women rights activist shades more light on how women are perpetrating patriarchy. Here’s what she has to say:
“In this era many women still perpetuate patriarchy through voting men into positions of authority. For example, at community meetings women opt to have a man taking up the role of chairperson, rather than a woman.
On inheritance issues women still prefer having a male child inheriting big assets such as houses, plots even vehicles over a female child whom they say can get married anytime and the inheritance with her.
Gender roles, we still find the girl child doing house chores whilst the boy child is left to play or even visit his friends. Boys do not cook, wash dishes and even sweep the yard and this reinforces male supremacy because the boy child will eventually grow up and fail promote the girl child wherever he goes. It becomes a cycle.
The new normal has paved way to many ills in our societies where the girl child is being exposed to child abuse in form of arranged marriages by their mothers due to hunger and the love of money. Statistics by MASO and Msasa show an upsurge in cases of child marriages which is very sad.
Solutions
There is still need to promote gender equality within households, where women teach their male children that their sisters are equally important and can also take up leadership positions as well as give solid contributions on family issues.
Awareness campaigns through radio programs and trainings must be regularly conducted. Even sending smses through all network providers.
Women organisations still have a major role to play in rectifying gender inequality.
Patriachy will never end if communities do not engage men, there is need to engage men so that they are taught on the importance of uplifting a girl child”
Let’s restore hope to the girl child, let’s teach her that she can be more, that she is not a waste of resources. It starts with us women. Let’s be our sisters’ keeper!!!