User:RosaWeber

The plight of the African woman!

Woman in general is supposed to be the primary caretaker in the family, she sees to it that the household is organised, the kids go to school and are well kept at all times, she is the better half of the man. The African woman is not different and not lacking in these responsibilities either. An African woman without an outlined agreement runs the household…without the normal monthly allowance from her hubby fends for the well being of the whole family. She plants the fields, harvest and brings to the market. She is the primary source of

An African woman without an outlined agreement runs the household…without the normal monthly allowance from her hubby fends for the well being of the whole family. She plants the fields, harvest and brings to the market. She is the primary source of income for the whole family. Let’s take a stroll back to the years of our forefathers when women generally were trained to be “housewives” but not partners in the society, for chiefs and kings wealth was measured by how many wives and daughters they had. Given these reasons alone men indulged in the practice of polygamy without any mental twinge… of course the society saw polygamy as a real respectable social stand and a basis of quick reproduction.

The African man would stay home and his wife was to do the planting, harvest, selling, housekeeping and naturally her dutiful commitment at the end of every day’s hard labour which would bring her to the joyful child bearing.

Her man, her lord just had to control and pride himself with the profit of the last harvest. Then it became logical for our forefathers to run a well established polygamous outfit.

Even today the concept of polygamy is not yet swept out, time brings change, change come with globalisation and modernisation, modernisation affects the culture and spits out westernisation which changes the way the African woman sees her plight!

The ground is not productive like it used to be, the water holds no more fishes for the commoner and the bushes echo with emptiness, harvest is not pleasant anymore.

In the rural areas there can only be seen faces of hungry children, the cries of starving babies, a film of malnutrited young ladies in the family way, the bowed heads of shame faced fathers…these nightmare alone should discourage polygamy.

Women are also learning to discourage the practice of polygamy they fight and kick against it as hard as they can. Westernisation has brought Education and Strive to the women of Africa. Talking to an African lady in Germany, she explained to TAT I couldn’t see myself in the battle of polygamy so that made my choices limited. Coming to Europe, things have drastically taken a different look. Polygamy is a tale to me and now divorce has became a constant treat to the future of the African woman in Diaspora