It is time to empower our South Sudanese Womenfolk
Are our Women in South Sudan really empowered?
By Mading Abraham Majur, Kampala, Uganda
November 25, 2015 (SSB) — I deplore the absence of women at the negotiating table in the democratic alliance; my condemnation is a concern for all who have a stake in this country and those that want the rights of women to be realized.
In fact the women themselves should explain why they are missing, were the bullied ignored, timid, or are they not interested? We need an explanation. Yes, we should have women at the negotiating table but they should not be mere static.
If there were more women for instance of Madam Awut Deng Achuil, the former minister of labour and public service and currently minister of gender and social welfare in South Sudan politics, we would not having this conversation.
It is important to demystify the myth of women’s emancipation in South Sudan; it has never been there first let us understand what emancipation is. It is the process of being set free from legal, social or political restrictions, what we have is token action with the aim of appeasing women; a strategy to show the international community that there is women emancipation.
Therefore, women have never been empowered in South Sudan. The governments of South Sudan policies towards women are just window dressing which is unfortunate.
The ideas of having women ministers and having them participate in politics were or are because of pressure from the international community. How many of them are in parliament today?
So after many years of affirmative action which is snarled in Juba capital, many areas because of communal and domestic violence have not seen and do not know what affirmative action is. We do not therefore have women at the negotiating table.
Women are still begging for quotas in politics and academically still demanding how many reach university level and even at secondary level, many drop out at primary school and taken for marriage, also it should be noted that our nation has competent women who have stretched in other countries but chosen not to joint politics because they are antipathetic forward it.
So where is the problem?
I think that many women human rights defends have failed in advocating for full women emancipation, most whom are poor and live in rural areas which can be attributed to paternalism on the one hand and the advocacy being elite- driven which has not trickled down to the majority on the other hand.
Many activists demand free things for women such as parliamentary seats, ministerial posts and places in university among other things without realizing that it promotes the notion that they are inferior.
Is there a solution?
I think there is first of all, this begging culture should stop, women have to demand equality and not tokenism, which means competing against men or boys on equal terms. Women should also demand the necessary protection to complete school and also demand quality healthcare, remember civic education is necessary for a society to be empowered, so that women activists have to invest their energies in civic education.
Ms. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, a Harvard educated woman, a former director of United Nations development program UNDP and active in politics rose to become the most powerful person in Liberia, the president.
How could this happen in Liberia which is more impoverished in Africa? I know and we all know that she and many women did not beg for political positions of course this is just half of the story.
We have Ms Maueer Kyalya, she is the only woman contesting for 2016 general elections in Uganda and she should be applauded with her decision. She is an example woman in Uganda and it should be too in South Sudan.
Most women in South Sudan do not participate in politics and even administrative work freely or on principle. Few women empowered, many of them with superlative credentials have opted to focus on their careers.
The author is student of Kyambogo University and he can be reached via majur20155@gmail.com
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