In the African setting, women are mostly relegated to playing second best and often running in the shadow of their male counterpart, which is one of the major reasons we are still lagging as a third world continent.
If you look at the Western setting and other developed nations, it is evident that women contribute as much as their male counterpart in the building and development of the country's socio-economic structure. This cannot be said in our clime as women have frequently been segregated and discriminated upon in anything socio-economic related.
The majority of them have also been brainwashed to believe that a woman's life begins and ends in the family unit.
This ideology, passed down from generations to generations, has impeded the mentality of most African women, making them feel the end point of their lives is getting married and having children.
Which, of course is a crucial role to be met, but then aside the family unit, women can be so much more if given the opportunity and chance to.
In my opinion, a woman can achieve twice as much and can be an equal game player as their male counterpart if she has the needed support.
And what is that support? The right words as a medium or form of encouragement, the right environment, enlightened parents, an understanding family and a supportive partner. Because often times, it is this aforementioned people that determines greatly a woman's future and achievements.
I have spent almost a decade of my life as a social worker, working with an NGO whose main goal is reducing poverty to the barest minimum. In all my years of experience, I have come to the realization that poverty sterns from female dependency, such that not empowering the girl child is a recipe for poverty.
Looking at the Northern and Southern regions of Nigeria, we'd see that the Northern part is worse hit with poverty because the women, especially in the rural setting, are made to be highly dependent and deprived of basic human empowerment. This is a staunch rule of thumb in that area because they have a strong rooted religious practice that has been misconstrued and intertwined with their culture.
Similarly, in the urban and rural setting of the Southern part of Nigeria, Urban women are most likely to navigate their way out of poverty.
They are often more industrious than rural women who are saddled with archaic customs and traditions of gender discrimination and bias.
It is this discovery of female relegation, especially in the rural areas, that has prompted the NGO I work with to be rooted but not restricted to the rural environment of the Northern part of Delta State Nigeria.
Our main focus includes; children, teenage boys and girls, widows, divorces (women) and the less privileged because these are the victims of the marginalized side of life.
One of the major cases we have handled over the years is that of Maria.
Maria was a family woman who lived with her husband and three children in a rural community. Her story is quite a pathetic one as her husband died while trying to protect her from being burnt alive.
As the story goes, Maria was accused of witchcraft. This came after the demise of a wealthy woman she had a fall-out with in their community.
The woman was a philanthropist and everyone in their community benefited from her good deeds and philanthropy.
When the woman died, the villagers were not having it. Soon rumors started spreading that upon confrontations between Maria and the lady, Maria threatened to deal with the woman.
What seemed like a joke or mere rumor became a serious issue when one evening the villagers stormed Maria's home demanding for her head. While her husband tried to buy her time so she can escape with the children, he was killed by the angry mob. Maria and her children on the other hand, narrowly escaped with Maria sustaining several burns on her head.
We saw Maria at the marketplace in the year 2018, when we went for financial and intellectual empowerment of market women in rural areas.
What drew my attention to Maria was the baby she was carrying. As we got done with our outreach and about to leave, I quickly showed her to my boss whom also took interest in her.
At first, we thought she was mad, but after numerous question and answer section with her, we discovered she wasn't, at least not entirely.
Maria narrated her ordeal to us, how she became homeless and a destitute for the past thirteen years. She told us how her children were taken away by random people and how she was sexually abused which resulted to the child she's carrying.
Getting Maria to this stage wasn't an easy task. We were able to track down one of the strangers who took two of Maria's children, and it was a battle of custody because we saw that she doesn't have the capacity to provide the basics for the children.
We also battled the police because the illegal guardian of Maria's children went first to the police station and filed a report against us accusing us of child trafficking and a threat to her life.
Furthermore, we battled Maria's family as they refused to take custody of her and her two children.
Finally, it was the women affairs commission of my state that interceded and settled the matter.
We were granted custody of Maria and her newborn, but we lost the custody battle of the other two children as they vehemently refused to reunite with their mother tagging her a witch.
The illegal guardian of the children won custody of them and that settled the case.
I tagged the lady an illegal guardian because she doesn't have the authorized documentations to be running a homeless shelter, but somehow she was running one with some teenagers under her custody heavily pregnant.
We tried to locate her first child who by then was an adult, but we could not. Rumor has it that she was taken to Lagos and was forcefully married off to her abuser when she became pregnant. At the time we tried locating her we heard she was in court.
Even though we could not save all of Maria's children, we were able to save her with the last child and gave her another opportunity at life to be part of the intricate structure of the economy.
PS
ALL IMAGES ARE MINE
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Excellent writeup. You've highlighted the major challenges of our society and also provided some
Thank you dear 😊
You're welcome 🤗🤗🤗
Thanks to you and your team for putting a smile on Maria's face. I cried reading this. There are thousands of women out there suffering. Her situation could have affected her mental health, imagine the scar on her head. But thank God she is well.
Women are now wise these days, most are routing for financial freedom, it must not end in marriage or having children. We are more powerful in all spheres of life.
Kudos to you and your team
Thank you for your appreciation dear ❤️. And yes women are striving to be better which makes our work really easy.
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Story of Africa in how rural woman battle without education, tilling the land, water bearer, producing food to feed a family, children get stolen sold into slavery or worse. Sad this is now rearing it's head throughout the world in many nations.
Stepping into line assisting these woman takes courage to keep fighting authorities, paving a way for the girl child to get a fair education enabling them to be productive further afield not only in the home.
Still more work is required to ensure safety of mother and child.
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Its a continuous process and we are not stopping 🙂🤝
Ongoing over the twenty years since I first became aware of the great need for woman and children in our own region, stay strong and keep assisting, people do need to get a helping hand.
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An example how badly needed is an organized local Woman's Advocacy.
I salute your courage my dear
We actually need to decolonization our minds from that male superiority and empower the ladies
Theologies too need to step up to d game and show they are capable and not be like parasite
I love this
Thank you 🙂. A lot of work needs to be done to ensure a sustainable future for our children..
Wow! You guys are really doing well for your country
I’m impressed
I think the northern parts of all west Africans are the same
I’m my country too, poverty rate is at its highest in the North
#dreemerforlife
Thank you 🥰
Yeah I read your write up and it crossed my mind too. I think we need to look into the root cause of this poverty for a sustainable solution. Another thing I noticed is that politics is not as strongly rooted amongst the people of the Northern region, like they have this herd mentality and are easily controlled compared to their Southern counterpart where everyone is striving for control.
See me smiling at all that you’re saying
I love intelligent women🥰
Awww thank you dear, intelligent woman need 100HBD from the 350HBD that you will win 🌚
Amen that I will win 350 hbd🤣🤣
Expecting my 100HBD 🥳
Mariah’s story is very saddening. I sometimes don’t understand how people can accuse others of things as critical as witchcraft or sorcery in an African society, because we all know that that accusation is more often than not a death sentence.
It’s good to hear that you found her and have come to her aid. There are several others like gee unjustly accused and persecuted, who were not lucky enough to have crossed paths with an organization like yours.
Ps: I dropped in on your post because of your bit unusual username (ironic coming from me), but I’m glad I did. Great job and very nice post!
Thank you, we need a lot of enlightenment to get Africans pass the witchcraft accusation stage. It is our duty as the educated and enlightened ones to continue from the colonial masters stop. An Herculean task but gradually in our own little environment we can make a positive difference that can spread.
I chose this name because it reminds me of human behavior, that thin line between 0 to 100 😅
Welcome dear friend, any story to your own name? 😃
Story to my name. Haha there is. It’s a very long one. But simply put, I chose it at a time when everything was going wrong for me. One of the worst times in my life so far. ONE of. Lol
Awww it's a good one 🙂
The story of Maria is a very touching one. imagine losing your husband, home and everything just in one day, ah! and the only place you have is the market where you were abused every day, abandoned by relatives and your children forcefully taken away. May we not find ourselves in this situation.
I commend you and your team's tireless effort and kindness in rehabilitating her. I understand it wasn't easy but you did it through God's grace.
#dreemerforlife
Thank you for your kind words Sist ❤️
Mad respect for you and your team for what you do. Thanks you people like you in every country we can say with some confidence that humanity is alive and it is not fully a dog eat dog world completely.
Thank you.
Cheers from a fellow #dreemerforlife
Indeed Humanity is not completely gone. Thank you for stopping by #dreemer 🌹
The society has indeed brainwashed most women in this part of the world making them think their lives revolves only in the house, I can remember a time when a one time Nigerian president said is wife is for the kitchen and bedroom. So pathetic, it doesn't just end there, a woman can do even more than a man can do. Just give her the chance and you would be amazed at the results she would produce. I hope most of our women would come to the light that they are not supposed to be held caged by the society in the position it deceived them to be. When both women and men are given equal opportunities, much more would be achieved.
I almost cried reading about maria, God bless you and your team for the excellent work. May God continue to enrich and empower your organization.
Her story taught me so much, no matter how hot the disagreement you have with someone is, one should be very careful with the words he or she uses for combat. They say walls have ears
I came across this post on Dreemport
Thank you for stopping by dreemer ❤️
You are always welcome ma 🥰
Wow, it is quite an ordeal and women have gone through a lot in time past especially in African and Nigeria. A job well done to your NGO for reaching out to these vulnerable people and for saving Maria and others who may have lost their voices . Skill acquisition is a good starting point for women to become financially independent
Thank you for your appreciation dear 😘