African Woman

Dark as the favourite cooking pot
Strong as the river rock scorched by the African sun
Wise as the stars in a darkened sky
Beautiful, where only God can see

She’s trudged for miles on hardened soles
Her skin, from pale to a near dark-blue
She’s laughed with each new birth
Cried when life sunk back to the Giver’s womb

Brown like the chocolatey earth
Her sunken cheeks a sign
Of sages whispering age old wisdom
And years of culture and tradition

She’s raised freedom fighters
The blood of a people’s freedom runs in her veins
She’s held back her own aspirations
To nurse her children and feed her nation

Fair, like the bark of the African teak
Cheeks wrinkled with laughter lines
Swing of wide hips that have birthed giants
Smiles tease the milk-white teeth behind kind lips

She’s walked where many don’t dare tread
And sat up nights wiping fever-chilled brows
She’s bent from years of carrying food, wood, children
Her fingers and toes are extensions of the earth

African woman
Applause alone will not do
Praise alone will not do
Ululations surely will not do

African woman,
She carries the world in her bosom
She balances the sun on her head
She supervises the rise and fall of the moon

We recognize you!
We applaud you, African woman

PoP 27 M ar 03

Raped

Last night a woman was raped two doors down from my room. She was raped several times, beaten and thrown out of the room at 3:47am on a cold Thursday morning. But that is my story, not hers.

At 3.45am, screams rent the air at the hostel. Sounds like mini thunder echoed down the stark corridor; fear filled my heart. Cautiously opening my door and peeking out, I was met with a scene reminescent of times gone by but still all too familiar. The sounds I had heard could now be attributed to slaps from the stout white man to the face of a lithe black young girl. This scene hit me like a ton of bricks and it felt like my blood had crept up suddenly, landing, hot like molten lava in my head. Fury lit the lava in a split second and all traces of sleep and reasoning disappeared.

The young girl said, amid shouts and screams, that she was a prostitute. Her client, the white man, had refused to pay her and was beating her in order for her to leave. Sooner than one could say cat, a stout watchman was by her side, manhandling her towards the way out. "Where were you when he picked me up, negotiated and slept with me? Where were you when my mother prostituted to feed my siblings and I? Will you pay me, now that you want me to leave? Will you give me a place to spend the rest of the night, she asked, amid sobs, screams and a rapidly blackening eye. In the meantime, the white man had silently closed the door behind him, undoubtedly to coil like a satisfied cat under the warm blankets.

"Don't manhandle me. Treat me with respect. Stop! Stop pushing me; at least let me leave with my pride". Mercifully the burly guard let her walk away on her own.

Why wasn't the man asked to leave the very Christian hostel in which we were staying, despite her loud requests that the management allows them to sort out their dilemma outside the premises?

Last night a woman was raped; raped several times by poverty, discrimination, disempowerment, inequality... Last night a woman was raped two doors down from my room. That is my story and I'm sticking to it.

(c) PoP

The Nature of Nurture

A neighbour’s dog recently broke my dog’s leg. To those out there who are in the dark about breaking of legs in the African context, this essentially means that some dog recently made my dog pregnant. I only realized this about two weeks before she got her puppies. Seven unplanned puppies of different colours came out of her one Thursday night in early November.

At first, she was very possessive and would not let us go within a few inches of her. She practically didn’t eat for the first two days, concentrating on her puppies, cleaning and nursing them. In the next two weeks, she got bolder, leaving them to go do whatever dogs do elsewhere. In the weeks that followed, she left the puppies more and more; sometimes just moving away to lie in the sun, at other times, walking off to the neighbouring houses or just lying outside the gate in wait for any family member coming back home.

Over the last few days, as we weaned the puppies, I noticed that our dog had become thinner. She wasn’t getting enough to eat as the pups would eat their share, and a bit of what she left for later, and still nurse. I also noticed something rather extraordinary; as she realized that her puppies were eating more, she started refusing to nurse them, and got very fierce when they approached her bowl of food.

This scenario reminds me of women in the role of wife and mother and teaches me a lesson I’d like to pass on. Many times, women take on the role the sacrificial lamb, morosely walking toward their own slaughter.

When there is little food, women eat last; their dreams, pleasures, desires, needs and wants are met last. Sometimes women are bitter at their husbands, children, and the world in general. Surprisingly, it is the women, who set these standards. We set the kind of relationship we want right from the commencement of each relationship, be it with our husbands, children, relatives or colleagues. Women have more control over family than they give themselves credit for.

Right from the time women begin a relationship with a prospective husband, we set the standards of respect expected and given, levels of importance of self, our career progression and path, how we will handle the in laws, relatives and children, etc. Think about it, it is all in our hands.

The lesson for me here is that there is no good in being a giver if one cannot be receiver. As women, we should remember to nurture ourselves first, emotionally, psychologically, physically and intellectually to be able to give these same traits to husbands, children, colleagues and others. You cannot give what you do not have.

Shall We Wage A Sex War?

The announcement recently made by President Kibaki that women would get three months maternity leave may be a step in the right direction, but it is still way below what Kenyan women deserve. For many women who have had to choose their jobs over their babies due to economic pressures, this announcement was pleasant, but came too late.

In the ongoing campaigns, very little has been said about issues directly affecting women. Neither ODM nor Charity Ngilu and The ‘Pentagon wives’ seem to be making any effort in pushing the women’s agenda, yet women are still the most marginalized and disempowered lot. President Kibaki’s PNU is quiet on women’s issues and does not seem to have a strong plan to handle the emancipation of women.

The call for affirmative action earlier in the year did not harness much support from the majority women, read workers, peasants, and hawkers. In fact, most of them did not even understand the concept of the action. Indeed it died a rather sudden death mainly because ruling class women who continually use the oppression of women as a stepping-stone to climb the socio-political ladder proposed it.

So it leaves us asking, who will fight for the rights of the majority women? Who will fight for the general labourers, mama mbogas, hawkers, peasants and fisherwomen? Who will articulate their issues on remuneration, maternity leave, childcare or working conditions? Who will fight for their rights to housing, land, medical care, inheritance and education?

So far, we have not seen any politicians go down to the grassroots to speak to the women on issues affecting them. LATF and CDF funds may sometimes trickle to organized women groups, but what happens to the major issues like decent housing, education, access to clean water, medical care and childcare. We all know that the quality of ‘free’ education offered by the government remains wanting.

Granted, the majority men; workers, hawkers and peasants are oppressed too. It is worthwhile to note that however oppressed a man may be, he has an outlet for his oppression. Many men still knowingly or unknowingly oppress their wives. Though both male and female workers are exploited at the work place, her husband will not hesitate to further dominate the worker woman. It’s not surprising then that with the rising cost of basic commodities, bus fares, and salaries that have remained static over the years; domestic violence has escalated. The woman is further stripped of her dignity and self worth.

So, shall we wage a war of the sexes or should we just curl up and die? Women and men must realize that we are complimentary to each another. A home where one partner is unhappy can never be a happy home. In order to win this war we must fight together side by side, each empowering the other as we struggle to overturn an exploitative system.

We need to organise the majority women so that as one, women can have an audible voice. In his speech commemorating International Women’s Day in Burkina Faso on March 8, 1987, Thomas Sankara said “The human being, this vast and complex combination of pain and joy, solitary and forsaken, yet creator of all humanity, suffering, frustrated and humiliated, and yet endless source of happiness for each one of us, this source of affection beyond compare, inspiring the most unexpected courage, this being called weak but possessing untold ability to inspire us to take the road of honour, this being of flesh and blood and of spiritual conviction – this being women, is you… We must restore to humanity your true image by making the reign of freedom prevail over differentiations imposed by nature and eliminating all kinds of hypocrisy that sustain the shameless exploitation of women.”

PoP 2 Nov 07