HARARE — She said her husband choked her, pounded her with open fists, and knocked her head on the wall before grabbing a thick leather belt which he used to whip her.
Today, over 21 days after Zimbabwe embarked upon a lockdown against COVID-19, Tracy Mukwende, who is aged 41 years, said her husband is languishing in jail.
The 48-year old husband, Denis was found guilty of causing serious bodily harm and sentenced to three years in prison in the middle of Zimbabwe’s lockdown.
For Tracy and Denis, a lockdown that was meant to be a time to bond rather turned into a conflict that has landed the latter in jail.
“I couldn’t do anything to stop my husband from constantly attacking me during the lockdown; I tried to endure, but failed and ended up reporting him to police; he abused me over very minor issues — for instance on the day I reported him he had beaten me for not serving him supper on time,” Tracy told Ubuntu Times.
Women in a community in Norton, a town 30 kilometers west of Harare the Zimbabwean capital end of 2018 gathered to demonstrate against rising cases of domestic violence in their area. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Yet, the two are not the only ones that have fallen apart during Zimbabwe’s lockdown.
There are ballooning cases of domestic violence as couples such as Tracy and Denis in Zimbabwe find more time together indoors, forced by coronavirus.
In less than two weeks into Zimbabwe’s initial 21-day lockdown, Musasa Project, a local non-governmental organization, said it had documented at least 782 cases of abuse compared to an average of 500 per month.
“We believe from the trends that we’re seeing that domestic violence is going to escalate,” said Rotina Musara, an advocacy program officer with Musasa Project.
Musasa Project concurs with the Women Coalition of Zimbabwe, a network of women rights activists and women’s organizations.
“As the lockdown continues we are concerned about the likelihood of an increase in gender-based violence (GBV) cases. At this stage GBV services need to be classified as essential services,” Ronika Mumbire, board chairperson of the Women in Zimbabwe Coalition, told Ubuntu Times.
A group of women from various civil society groups in October 2015 gathered in the Zimbabwean capital Harare demonstrating against sexual abuse in workplaces. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
A day before the expiration of Zimbabwe’s 21-day lockdown which begun on March 30, the country’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa announced a 14-day extension of the same saying the country had not yet met the World Health Organization benchmarks to warrant the lifting of a lockdown.
To couples confined in their homes by the marauding pandemic, the move has not been easy, resulting in many caught up in domestic conflicts.
Now, instead of fighting COVID-19, many Zimbabwean couples are fighting one another.
Catherine Mkwapati, a women rights defender and also director of the Youth Dialogue Action Network, a civil society organization here, said ‘arguments and conflicts are escalating among couples because they are living together 24 hours a day, forced to do so by the national lockdown.’
“You would realize that many men now confined indoors with their wives are not formally employed and because without income, they get angry when asked to make plans for the family’s food provisions, for instance, and this triggers violence,” Mkwapati told Ubuntu Times.
Even Musara of the Musasa Project, said ‘we have got young women who have been physically assaulted for asking for food to feed the family, especially in cases where the woman relies on the husband to provide food.’
With unemployment hovering above 90 percent in Zimbabwe, according to the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, most people are dependent on daily informal trade to earn a living.
But, amid the continuing lockdown, even dependency on informal trade for survival is no longer possible, and couples have to bear the brunt of hunger confined in their homes.
In Zimbabwe, women have become top agricultural producers, yet oppressed by their male counterparts who rob them of the fruits of their labor. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
By the 23rd of April, Zimbabwe had 29 confirmed cases of COVID-19, with four deaths recorded since the disease pounced on the Southern African nation.
Coronavirus broke out for the first time end of last year in Wuhan, a city in Hubei Province in China, before it swiftly spread to several countries across the globe.
To Zimbabwean feminists like Musara, ‘as much as we say COVID-19 is an emergency, gender-based violence is an emergency as well.’
“Once gender-based violence is declared an emergency, at least we will have various actors coming together, sitting at the same table, and trying to come up with solutions to help especially women being victimized,” said Musara.
Priscilla Misihairabwi-Mushonga, a Zimbabwean legislator, said ‘I don’t necessarily agree with the fact that men are abusing women because they are confined; abusers have always been abusers.’
To many women rights defenders like Mkwapati, in Zimbabwe, ‘the lockdown is proving to be having far-reaching consequences because those who are in abusive relationships are now restricted face-to-face with their tormentors.’
Even as they have fought tooth and nail through mobilization by women rights organizations, Zimbabwe’s women and children remain topmost victims of domestic violence. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Even as Zimbabwean police have said people can still report to them cases of domestic violence during the lockdown, many victims of domestic violence like 28-year old Mavis Chitoro have said ‘it is hard to call police when you are locked down in the same house with your abuser.’
Other gender activists such as Chelesile Nyathi of South Western Region Gender Network (SWRGN), a regional gender-focused network, said ‘when people spend more time together, chances are high that they start having multiple incidents of violence at home.’
To Nyathi, ‘when there is added stress in the home it increases the frequency and severity of abuse. This, in turn, creates greater risk of domestic violence.’
But, to Mumbire of the Women in Zimbabwe Coalition, hope is all they can embrace in the fight against domestic violence as the lockdown continues.
“With the now extended lockdown being in place, we are hoping that perpetrators of domestic violence will be brought to book,” said Mumbire.
Kericho, April 20 — On a fine Monday morning, and as the sun beats down on the tea farms in Kaptoroi village in Kenya’s Kericho County, Sarah Keter plucks tea together with her brother-in-law and his wife. They are helping each other rotate and pick the green leaves in their farms for sale at the buying center just across the road from their farm.
Today, and since the confirmation of the first case of coronavirus in the country on March 13, they have to sell their tea very early in the morning by 9:45 am. This is in line with the government directive that all workplaces should close by 4 pm, three hours before the 7 pm to 5 am curfew that was imposed by President Kenyatta. As such, factory workers have to be out of the factories by 4 pm.
They are all jovial as they tell of the looming good prices for their produce, as the demand goes up for tea in Europe and other countries who are on lockdown, and people need tea inside their houses. This coupled with the measures and directives that the Kenyan Ministry of Agriculture has put in place to ensure that tea farmers in the country get value for their produce.
Thomas and his wife pick tea on their farm at Kaptoroi village in Kenya’s Kericho County on April 20, 2020. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
“I listened to the news and heard what the Minister said about phasing out cartels and brokers in the tea sector. For many years, tea was all we knew and tea farmers were rich. It is very sad that we are now categorized as poor, despite farming tea, a major foreign exchange earner for the country,” says Thomas Keter, Sarah’s brother-in-law.
After the lorry that ferries tea arrives, Sarah walks to the tea buying center where upon arrival she washes her hands and puts on a mask before she is allowed to enter the center. She then spreads her tea on the floor and a factory official inspects it for quality freshness then weighs them, after which she is handed a sales receipt.
Sarah Keter carries tea on her back to the buying center at Kaptoroi village in Kericho County. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
In its presser last week, the agriculture ministry announced that tea farmers are going to get 50% their proceeds remitted directly to their factory accounts, rather than go through bank-management accounts where they are mismanaged, delayed, and later written off as bad loans.
The farmers here have known no other source of livelihood and proceeds from the sale of tea has seen them take their children to school, but in most cases are left with nothing. For instance, when someone has a farm and cannot pick tea on his own like the Keters, one has to hire another person to pick it. They then pay half of what the tea is worth to the person picking it.
Sarah Keter picks tea on her farm at Kaptoroi village in Kenya’s Kericho County on April 20, 2020. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
One kilogram of tea is sold to the Kenya Tea Development Agency Holdings at Ksh16 ($0.16) per kilo. The person picking tea gets Ksh8 ($0.08) per kilo. This is before a farmer is also met with deductions for development, such as building of factories, supply of fertilizer, and many other statutory deductions.
“What we normally only depend on is the yearly bonus because what we get monthly is paid out to the pickers. And that is why we have decided as family to help each other pick the tea, so we can at least save the money,” Sarah says.
Sarah washes her hands before she enters the tea buying center as David Kosgei, the Chairman looks on. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
Kenya’s Minister for Agriculture Peter Munya in his April 16th press conference at Kilimo House in Nairobi introduced the measures, which he says will help place the Kenyan tea farmers in their rightful place.
“We want them to earn 50% of what their green tea leaf is worth so that farmers can also have a monthly income like every other person, and then you can give them the rest 50% in what is called the yearly bonuses,” he says.
Kenya’s tea sector alone generates 23% of the country’s total foreign exchange earnings, making it one of the leading exports for the country. The sector also employs and supports a population of about five million people. It generates over Ksh117 billion in export earnings and a further Ksh22 billion in local sales.
Sarah pours green tea leaves onto the floor at the buying center for inspection before she sells it to the Kenya Tea Development Agency. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO), the main buyers of Kenyan tea are Pakistan, Egypt, and the UK accounting for more than 65 percent of national tea exports. Forced to a lockdown by the COVID-19, the demand for tea has gone up as people need tea as they stay indoors.
“In spite of the economic and social challenges forced to Kenya and indeed the global community by the coronavirus pandemic, tea production and trading have continued unabated, with tea exports being shipped to about 40 market destinations monthly since January 2020,” said Munya.
Sarah airs her tea leaves to make sure they are fresh as the factory official inspects it before it is bought. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
This has come as a blessing in disguise for the tea farmers in Kenya who can now smile as both the government changes in the sector as well as the rising demand for tea only means that they will smile to the bank in the next few days.
Sarah Keter weighs her tea at the point of sale at the buying center at Kaptoroi village. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
Still on April 16, Kenya Airways dispatched a Dreamliner plane with 40 tons of fresh produce to London. The plane was a passenger one that had been grounded to curb the spread of COVID-19. Tea farmers are happy that tea is among the fresh produce that is being ferried to Europe and other markets.
“We hope that a cure is soon found and that the market will continue to be steady so that we can still supply the produce, which include this tea,” Sarah says.
Sarah watches as her tea is weighed and recorded, then she is given a sales receipt. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
The Kenyan government now gives the tea farmers a 14-day period to participate by airing their opinion on the measures that the government has taken. The farmers already support the measures and say that they will support the policies before the government gazettes them after the fourteen days.
“These are good news to the farmer that has taken too long to implement and therefore has led to the farmers suffering when they should be earning better,” says David Kosgei, a chairman at the Kaptoroi tea buying center where the Keters sell their tea.
HARARE, April 19 — Zimbabwe’s 21 days of lockdown to save the country from further infections from coronavirus have hammered the country’s cross-border traders who operate from this country into the neighboring countries in the region.
South Africa, known for accommodating cross-border traders from Zimbabwe, shut its border between the two countries closer to a month ago and only traffic moving essential goods and services is being allowed to cross the border.
This Southern African nation’s Cross-Border Traders’ Association (CBTA) has been on record in the media saying about 10,000 cross-border traders have been traveling to South Africa daily.
But, with the lockdown actuated by the coronavirus, the travels by cross-border traders from Zimbabwe came to a halt and hard times have hit the country’s migrant traders.
“Our members have fallen on hard times because they can’t, for now, cross borders to do their trade although cross-border trading is their only source of income,” Jameson Tumbare, a member of the Cross Border Traders Association, told Ubuntu Times.
Meanwhile, as Zimbabwe went into the 21-day lockdown last month on the 30th of March, president of the Cross Border Traders Association, Killer Zivhu said ‘the message is that let’s heed the President’s call and avoid traveling outside the country for the next two months.’
But, thousands of traders who have relied heavily on ordering goods for resale from neighboring countries here have claimed they face hard times as they can’t cross the borders to do business.
“This lockdown means poverty for us as we are not in business anymore and we get no support from government,” one of the cross-border traders based in Harare, 33-year old Melinda Chiundura, told Ubuntu Times.
However, it may be until the COVID-19 scare is over that Zimbabwe’s cross border traders may be allowed to ply their trade, according to Zivhu.
Government officials have insisted cross-border traders would have to abide by the lockdown to help the country contain further spread of the feared COVID-19.
“We have millions of cross-border traders and it’s just too early to open the border for them because surely they will be at risk of infection because more often than not they have to shop or sell in crowded places each time they cross borders,” a top government official from the Ministry of Home Affairs, told Ubuntu Times on condition of anonymity as she was unauthorized to speak to the media.
Coronavirus broke out towards the end of last year in Wuhan, a city in China in the Asian country’s Hubei Province before it spread to hundreds of countries across the globe, killing thousands and infecting over two million people.
In Zimbabwe, so far four people have died from coronavirus, with the country having 25 cases of people who have tested positive for the dreaded disease by Saturday recently amid widespread reports the poor African country is conducting very few COVID-19 tests.
Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa declared a 21-day lockdown which began at the end of last month in a bid to contain the spread of the coronavirus, which he has also extended by two weeks this Sunday in the face of rising cases of the pandemic here.
The decree by Mr. Mnangagwa ordered all Zimbabweans, including the country’s cross-border traders to stay at home ‘except in respect of essential movements related to seeking health services, the purchase of food or carrying out responsibilities that are in the critical services sectors.’
According to a 2018 International Monetary Fund report, Zimbabwe’s informal economy, which also includes cross-border trading, is the largest in Africa, and second only to Bolivia in the world.
The informal sector here accounts for approximately 60 percent of all of Zimbabwe’s economic activity.
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania — A swell of laughs and chatter fills the air as men and women dine and wine.
The spectacle grabs the attention of a group of foreign journalists, who spotted a lavish Ethiopian restaurant, known for its sumptuous traditional cuisines, as they were aimlessly strolling in the streets of Cape Town.
Among them is Chol Duang, a 28-year-old South Sudanese TV reporter and news anchor. The scribes were in CapeTown for a week-long training Workshop for reporting religion and LGBT issues.
A smart-dressed waiter, clutching food & beverage menus rushes to the table, splashing gleaming black booklets.
A visibly excited Duang grabs one, and after a cursory glance, he makes his mind.
“Let me order this,” he mutters as the waiter listens attentively.
Duang ordered Injera. This is a savory Ethiopian dish, entail a sourdough flat bread with slightly spongy texture. It’s usually served with grilled goat meat or succulent beef slathered in spicy hot stew.
A mid-aged Chef in a giant toque blanche hat grabs sliced pieces of anointed meat and toss them on a hot grill for slow sizzling.
A vile stench wafts, as woman scolds a nagging toddler in perfect Swahili. She then frantically whisked him away to a nearby toilet. The stench becomes unbearable, and Duang orders the waiter to freshen the air with a deodorized spray.
Soon the waiter returns with a tray containing ketchup, salt, chili, spoons, soft napkins and forks. On his way back, he stubs his toe and falls down.
Chol Duang in Grey suit poses for a photo with employees of Christian Monitor Magazine during his visit to the United States in 2019. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
Duang burst out laughing.
Kemo Cham, a senior editor with Sierra Leone-based Politico newspaper, politely warns Duang not to laugh at him.
The food soon arrives. Duang cuts a piece of bread and eats it.
“This is very delicious” he chuckles while patting his pockets to reach a vibrating smartphone.
Duang’s first trip to the legislative capital of South Africa, arguably was a defining moment for his media career. It was a pleasant opportunity to forget, the dirty realm of history in his war-torn country.
Charming, singularly modest, with a fine intellect, Duang is a gifted young leader endowed with an inherent ability to build and sustain relationships.
“His landmark smiling face makes him irresistible,” says Cham, adding “He is open and friendly.”
According to Kemo, Duang’s chatty nature makes it easy to see his characteristic smartness and intelligence.
“Meeting him changed a lot about my grim thoughts about his war-torn country of South Sudan,” he says.
During the five-day workshop, the South Sudanese scribe, who always wears a smile and a deceptive sense of humor, displayed exceptional intellectual ability.
SOCIALIZATION
He mingles so effortlessly with people from all walks of life.
Duang, who has assumed a new role as a political activist, and a strategist committed to reverse a dangerous narrative being peddled by the ruling elites in South Sudan, that Salva Kiir, the current president is the solution to the misery pitting the war-ravaged country, is also a fellow of the Mandela Washington Fellowship for young African Leaders — a flagship program of the U.S government’s Young African Leaders Initiative(YALI).
Chol Duang attentively listen to a briefing in one of his newsroom visits in the United States during Mandela Washington Fellowship. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
Duang who had until recently worked for the state broadcaster, SSBC-TV, the only television in South Sudan, is considered by a legion of his followers a symbol of hope for the young people in the war-ravaged country.
It’s rare for a TV broadcaster to join a rebellion, but Duang made a surprise move. In February, he announced on social media that he was ditching his media career to join a rebel movement.
Duang, whose vision is to make South Sudan a prosperous nation with abundant opportunities for the youth, has joined General Paul Malong Awan Anei — the former Chief of General Staff of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army, who’s the current leader of South Sudan United Front (SSUF/A). Duang wants to help “pursue South Sudanese dreams.”
According to Duang, General Malong, is a mentor through whom young people can grow and develop their skills and help the community.
Chol Duang poses with General Paul Malong, a rebel leader in an unknown location. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
Duang believes General Malong was falsely removed as South Sudan Army Chief of Staff by a clique who wanted to prolong the civil war to benefit from the national wealth.
“He’s since refused to wage a war and advocated for silencing guns across the country because he cares about South Sudanese people so much. But a propaganda machine run by the state continues to untruly portray General Malong as a warmonger.
Malong, is largely popular in the country and that’s the threat to the political and security establishment,’’ Duang asserts.
TROUBLED HISTORY
Chol Duang and colleagues following a briefing during the visit to the United States. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
The world’s newest country which formally declared its independence from Sudan on July 9, 2011, has been ravaged by a ruinous civil war that has killed hundreds of thousands of people.
The country’s independence comes after a referendum that saw a nearly 99 percent vote in favor of secession.
Salva Kiir was sworn in as president, with Riek Machar as his deputy. The two men are rivals but also leaders in the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) that led the push to secede from Sudan, which is now South Sudan’s northern neighbor.
In an interview with Ubuntu Times, Duang, eloquently explained the reasons behind his decision to join the rebel movement.
“I have taken this decision to fight on behalf of the young generation in which I am part,” says Duang, adding, “I realized that my media voice was getting suppressed slowly by those in power.”
According to Duang, his four-year media career has given him a rare glimpse of what he claims South Sudan’s “Murky, criminal and retrogressive system.”
Duang is increasingly concerned by endemic tribalism, favoritism, cronyism, and discrimination currently taking root in South Sudan that has pushed thousands of youths on the edge of survival.
As a victim of “uncle politics” Duang has immensely suffered in silence watching others climb the ladder to prosperity.
He accuses what he calls glaringly incompetent South Sudanese elite, who, he claims have escaped poverty at the expense of the majority of people trapped in the quagmires of poverty.
Unlike other East Africans, South Sudanese youth who suffered from impaired education, have limited access to opportunities.
“They are uncertain about their future which appears robbed and exploited,” Duang stresses
While leadership world over has shifted to young people, Duang believes the majority of youth suffer and the privileged few tend to deny the suffering of others.
Chol Duang poses for a photo in an unknown location. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
Born in 1992 from a family of three brothers and many siblings from his polygamous father, Duang was lucky to flee Sudan, then, at the height of political turmoil which culminated in the independence of South Sudan.
“My mother is the second wife and came from a wealthy rural background,” he says, adding: “I was lucky to receive strong upbringing from both parents.”
His home region, Northern Bahr Ghazal (Aweil), nestled on the border with The Sudan, and was the epicenter of many Sudanese wars, that crippled its development and kept it on the periphery from current political leadership.
From his humble beginnings, Duang grew up helping his family herding goats, fishing and watching over their crops from birds, as a child.
Because school was not a priority when he was growing up; Duang’s future was uncertain.
“My early childhood schooling was largely informal, and the future was bleak,” he says.
As a young schoolboy growing up in a sprawling swathe of Africa’s youngest nation, Duang and his peers huddled under a huge tree known as ‘Kuwel’, shielding themselves from the blazing sun.
The giant tree, which served as a classroom, was also used for church services and as a playground for Angol and other nearby villages.
Lack of educational materials meant that learning was an uphill struggle for Duang.
“I wrote on the floor for almost a year before I was provided one exercise book later in 2002,” he recalls.
Guided by a burning desire to get education amidst air bombardment unleashed by Sudanese military Junta, Duang switched schools while searching for knowledge.
Educated in both Uganda and Kenya, Chol returned to his country, South Sudan, in 2015 to participate in the ‘Development’ effort. Two years earlier, a civil war had broken out across the country, and Duang thought his journalism career would help tell South Sudan’s story, especially about the conflict. This hope would be frustrated by South Sudan’s political actors and state apparatus, who have become wary of journalists telling the truth about their actions.
“South Sudanese youth appear to be mere spectators in their own affairs. Interestingly, they’re lobbying on behalf of elderly politicians for appointment. They doubt themselves that they cannot hold public office,” his comment on Facebook in February this year reads.
In an attempt to deprive South Sudanese children the right to education, Duang says authorities in Khartoum then criminalized schools.
“Male children were then abducted and teachers either killed or kidnapped along with children,” he says.
This move prompted Duang’s parents to send him to a refugee settlement in Uganda where he continued with his education.
“Schools in the refugee camp were relatively better compared with what I had learned in my home,” Duang says.
Chol Duang, second right interviewing a group of people in Juba. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
HOW HE BECOMES A JOURNALIST
Duang never woke up one morning wanting to be a journalist. The realization that his future lay in journalism hinged on a burning desire to tell the story of a war-torn country.
“I was in Uganda when I decided to study Journalism,” he says.
Haunted by an unending wave of violence, which crippled his learning, Duang did not initially have the skills he needed to effectively communicate at University.
“When I finished high school at Zana Mixed Secondary school in Kampala, in 2011, it became a tough choice for me whether to go ahead and do Journalism or Diplomacy, which was my second preference,” he says.
“I made up my mind and took Journalism immediately after high school.”
As is the case everywhere in Africa, it was quite natural for Duang’s elder siblings to support him and pay for his education from primary through secondary. They’d continued to support his college years in Nairobi.
“While in Journalism college, I taught myself writing, speaking and reading so that I would leave college well prepared for the field,” he told Ubuntu Times.
“I would address community events and read consistently for improvement and knowledge,” the former TV anchor remembers.
Duang completed his college education in 2015 and quickly started an internship with South Sudan television, and, thereafter, got retained by the station after his 3-month training.
As the civil war expanded, Duang was thrust into covering the very conflict, traveling around either with the military or UN convoys when they’re on assessment missions.
Armed with an Advanced Diploma in Journalism and Communication Science, Duang spent four years working as a TV reporter, assistant news editor, and news anchor.
As a cub reporter, Duang extensively reported about the country’s civil war, which put him in the line of fire.
“As a young reporter, I didn’t have the skills for war reporting nor did I have a bulletproof vest for my safety. My parents became concerned and once floated the idea for me to quit, which I dismissed. I would travel from place to place as I interviewed civilians fleeing violence,” he narrates. “Throughout my four years at the TV, my reporting had been in Upper Nile and Central Equatorial region where conflict largely concentrated,” he says.
Chol Duang speaks in an undated public event. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
2018 YEI HOTEL INCIDENT
Duang had traveled to the town of Yei to cover a sporting event intended to encourage the local people to return home from bushes. That event would be interrupted when a hotel, where journalists and UN workers were staying, was attacked at night, resulting in 4 deaths. “When my job became increasingly dangerous after our hotel was attacked in Yei on March 24, 2018, my family advised me against accepting risky assignments from the TV. It was after that advice that I ventured into social and entertainment stories. I also realized that much of the real stories get blocked by government censors, making our daring reporting invalid. This discouraged me greatly and my Journalism passion began to wane steadily,” he says of his past experience, adding: “This apathy was being watched by agents who started to question me. Also, my involvement in international journalism training programs and human rights activism raised the eyebrows higher, leading them to ramp up interest in me.”
ITUNDA, Tanzania — It is midday at Itunda, a tiny village in Tanzania’s southern highlands and Marietta Andrea* is perched awkwardly on a wooden stool, her protruding belly touching a make-shift stall as she briskly packs roasted groundnuts, encrusted with salt into thin polyethylene bags ready to sell.
“I’m just helping my mother. It is not something I would do if I was going to school,” says Andrea.
The 17-year-old girl, became pregnant and was expelled from school—crushing her future dreams. Andrea, who wanted to be a teacher, was lured by Bodaboda (motorcycle), who offered her free rides to school.
“He was just a friend, but when he started to give me gifts, I couldn’t resist the temptation,” Andrea tells Ubuntu Times.
Lack of comprehensive sex education means that Andrea blindly gave in to a sex predator who destroyed her future.
Once a hard-working student at Ilula Secondary School, Kilolo district, Iringa region, Andrea was yearning to become a teacher and help marginalized children in the impoverished village to get an education and succeed in life. Instead, she became pregnant thus her dreams melted away.
Distraught, Andrea, who’s heavily pregnant, is wobbling daily on a rugged terrain to the bustling market where her mother sells various consumer goods.
She is not alone. Many girls, who become pregnant are expelled from school every year.
Under the country’s 2002 policy, a student can be expelled from school if they commit an offense against morality.
“This is a bad policy. It blindly ignores the worsening plight of pregnant girls and young mothers” says Onesmo Ole Ngurumwa, a Dar es Salaam-based human rights defender.
A group of peer educators are singing and dancing as a way to send messages about the impact of teen pregnancies in Shinyanga region in 2014. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
In 2017 Tanzania President, John Magufuli entrenched this policy, when he publicly declared that girls who become pregnant should not be allowed to return to school.
“As long as I am president… no pregnant student will be allowed to return to school…After getting pregnant, you are done,” he stated.
Tanzania has one of highest adolescent pregnancy and birth rates in the world, with 21 percent of girls aged 15 to 19 having given birth, according to 2015/16 data by Tanzania Bureau of Statistics (TBS).
More than 55,000 schoolgirls in Tanzania have been expelled from schools over the last decade under this policy which blatantly ignores jarring realities that lead to pregnancies, campaigners said.
“If I get a chance to go back to school. I wouldn’t hesitate a moment. That’s would be the only way to realize my dreams,” says Andrea.
While Tanzania government has the duty to protect girls’ right to education and safeguard them from sexual exploitation, observers say, pregnant girls and young mothers are still treated with astounding contempt.
“I feel I am a laughing stock. Some people are scolding me while pointing an accusing finger,” says Andrea.
Teen pregnancy is the main factor forcing many girls in Iringa to drop out of school. This stark reality, badly affect young mothers and their babies.
Nestled on the plains of Udzungwa mountain ranges, the wind-swept Itunda village, is home to many HIV/AIDS orphans.
A young facilitator addresses young mothers in Shinyanga about engaging in alternative income-generating activities in Shinyanga region in 2014. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
In the neighboring Masukanzi village, a tall, bubbly 19-year-old Hanifa Mdette sits on a mat, stirring porridge ready to feeds her plump two-year-old son. A wide-eyed cat mews, as a plume of smoke wafts from a shaky kitchen.
Mdette, who dropped out of school in 2017 says her future is bleak.
“I don’t think I can get any good work without education,” she says.
At the center of the crisis, is an entrenched patriarchal system and deep-rooted Hehe traditions where underage pregnancies are considered a curse, pregnant girls are ostracized.
However, there’s a glimmer of hope for Andrea and other young mothers as the World Bank has injected new funding which will partly be spent to address their worsening plight.
As part of its initiative to revamp ailing education system in Tanzania, the World Bank has approved a whopping 500 million USD loan, part of which will be used to re-instate pregnant girls and young mothers who are kicked out of school.
The $500 million Secondary Education Quality Improvement Project (SEQUIP) will benefit 6.5 million students in public schools and establish stronger educational pathways for those out of a formal school system.
The project is designed to help adolescent children to transition to upper secondary education. It offers pregnant girls, young mothers, and other vulnerable girls the possibility to return to school.
Moved young mothers join the floor dancing during one of the education sessions in Shinyanga in 2014. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
While Tanzanian children deserve better education majority of girls miss the opportunity every year, says Mara Warwick, World Bank’s Country Director for Tanzania.
“This is an important step in addressing the challenges that Tanzania children face throughout their education,” she says.
Although Tanzania adopted Free Basic Education Policy in 2015, which helped increased primary school enrollment from 8.3 to 10.1 million by 2018, and raise secondary school enrollment to 2.2 million from 1.8 million, observers say the government has failed to improve quality of education and reduce drop-out rates.
“Tanzania is suffering from a learning crisis where children are not in school, or are in school but not learning,” said Jaime Saavedra, World Bank’s Global Director for Education.
Human Rights Watch, however, criticized the World Bank for “failure to use its leverage” and caved to Tanzania’s discriminatory ban and practices, undermining its own commitment to non-discrimination.
Schoolgirls in Tanzania are routinely subjected to mandatory pregnancy test and those found pregnant are permanently expelled.
“The World Bank should be working with governments to move education systems toward full inclusion and accommodation of all girls in public schools, including those who are pregnant or parents,” said Elin Martinez, senior children’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch in a statement.
Equality Now, an international charity that champions the rights of girls and women calls on the government to lift the discriminatory ban against school-going pregnant girls.
Joyce Ndalichako, Tanzania Minister for Education Science and Technology recently said that the government is committed to ensuring pregnant girls who drop out of school will be allowed to go back to public school.
“We wish to assure the general public and our partners that the government remains fully committed to seriously implement the SEQUIP project according to the project design and agreement made with the World Bank,” the Minister said in a statement.
A group of peer educators are singing and dancing as a way to send messages about the impact of teen pregnancies in Shinyanga region in 2014. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
This is the first time Tanzania officials publicly announced the girls who have “dropped out” of school, due to pregnancy and other reasons will be allowed to continue their education.
Girls’ rights activists, however, received this public statement with cautious optimism.
In an interview with Ubuntu Times, Judy Gitau, Africa Coordinator of Equality Now—a global charity campaigning for girls’ and women’s rights expressed cautious optimism on the government’s promise.
“This is the first positive declaration…in four years, if the government acts upon its promise,.. it will be a welcome first step towards pregnant adolescent girls finally realizing their rights to education,” she stressed.
“The government has been unequivocal in stating that pregnant girls will be barred from attending mainstream school, not just for duration of their pregnancy but for life,” said Gitau.
Under the World Bank-funded project, officials are striving to help all school drop-outs pursue their secondary education and halt the practice of expelling pregnant girls from public schools.
“The public notice comes hot on the heels of SEQUIP funds being released by the World Bank, which has declared publicly that it has been advocating for girls access to education,” says Gitau.
Local and international civil society groups, including Equality Now, have been calling, urging the World Bank to withhold the funds until Tanzania withdraw discriminatory policy barring pregnant schoolgirls from attending school.
“We surmise that there is a direct correlation between the World Bank, finally approving its $500 million loan… and the country’s Minister of education releasing a public notice citing the inclusion of pregnant girls in accessing education,” she said.
Campaigners say this discriminatory policy has affected thousands of girls who are denied the right to education for life.
“It should be noted that some of these girls are victims of sexual violence and child marriages” Gitau said adding “it is a reflection of Tanzania government’s failure to address the root cause of adolescent pregnancies”
Juliet Kilewo, a victim of child marriages, who dropped out of school because her father wanted to marry her off in December 2020, reacts to a cameraman. She was rescued by Women rights campaigners. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
Education is crucial for fighting poverty and has an impact on social and economic welfare of individuals and the society.
Denying teenage mothers the right to education, campaigners say is equal to gender discrimination which reduces girls’ life opportunities, making it harder to fight poverty.
Gitau urged Tanzania authorities to seriously solve adolescent pregnancies and other economic and sexual exploitation of women and girls.
“Efforts to eradicate violence against girls and women in Tanzania must be stepped up and laws against sexual violence need to be better enforced to ensure that offenders are punished,” she said.
She called upon the government to eliminate stigma and discrimination borne by pregnant girls and adolescent mothers along with survivors of sexual violence.
As the world is reeling on the brink of the COVID-19 pandemic, Gitau warned Tanzania authorities to protect adolescent girls who are at risk of sexual abuse and exploitation.
“The closure of schools and other safeguarding institutions, quarantine rules and the restriction of movement, and loss of income in families as a result of the severe economic downturn, are all factors that increase the vulnerability of girls,” she said.
*Names have been changed to protect identities of the girls
Kisumu, April 8 — At 7 am in the morning, fishermen are docking in their fishing boats on the Dunga Beach in Kisumu’s Lake Victoria shores in western Kenya. They bring ashore their night’s catch and fishmongers crowd around their boats, buying the catch from them.
Among the most popular fishes that the Lake is known for is the tilapia and the Nile Perch; the mongers scamper for them as they are well aware that they will not miss a buyer this time around.
A few weeks ago, this was not the case as there was a steady import of, especially the tilapia species, from China into the Kenyan market. The import had negatively affected the trade in locally-sourced fish in the country as many people do not know the difference and had hence quit eating the fish altogether.
Francisca Odhiambo bargains the fish before she buys from a fisherman in his boat at the Dunga Beach in Kisumu’s Lake Victoria. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
At the shores, Francisca Odhiambo, a 44-year-old mother of five is busy buying fish from the fishermen, then scaling and gutting them for sale to the traders who come to the shores to buy and transport the fish to different parts of the country.
From the first fisherman, Odhiambo buys a dozen fish, which she scales and guts, and after a few minutes, she sells them all off and awaits the next boat to dock.
“Now, the trade is better than before as people are now sure that there is no fish coming in from China after they heard that China is the place where the coronavirus broke out from. And even though the coronavirus scare has slowed down the consumption of the fish in hotels and restaurants in towns, many of the fish is going to homes as many people stay home and order that the fish be taken to them,” she says.
A fish trader deep-fries fish for customers who come to buy at the beach on April 8, 2020. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
There had been concerns surrounding the import of fish from China, as it was hurting the trade of the fish in Kenya. During a meeting with small scale traders at Strathmore University in Nairobi in October 2018, Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta had promised to stop the fish imports, saying that the country could say “the Chinese fish was bad”. This prompted Beijing to take action, also promising to stop funding key projects in the country, including the standard gauge railway (SGR).
Nairobi then quickly backed down, allowing more of the Chinese fish to be imported and sold around the country.
The virus outbreak, that is stretching the world’s health apparatus has in a way proved to be a blessing in disguise for the Kenyan fish traders as their businesses now boom.
Odhiambo scales and guts fish on the shores of Lake Victoria as she prepares them for sale. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
Fredrick Omondi, a resident of Kisumu says that now there is a sigh of relief as he is now able to eat fish without worrying about its quality and source.
“Born here on the shores of the Lake, we have always known no other staple food apart from fish. Fish is what defines us as the Luo tribe and for the past few years, we have had to worry about the fish we get, especially the ngege (tilapia). I wonder why our government would allow the Chinese to saturate our fish market when we have our own fish,” Omondi poses.
Aloice Ager, the director of Kisumu Governor’s press unit and the county government spokesperson expresses optimism that the local supply of fish in the county can feed the whole country without having to import fish.
“What had prompted the import of fish from China was the hyacinth that had clouded the Lake and suppressed the breeding of fish. But now, after the clean-up the riparian counties around the Lake are reporting catching of large numbers of fish,” Ager says.
Francisca Odhiambo, a fishmonger at Dunga Beach at the shores of Lake Victoria selects fish inside a boat before she buys from a fisherman at the beach. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
The clean-up of the lake has created more opportunities for our people as more fishermen now want to go back to the Lake to fish since there is now plenty of fish. Lake Victoria is not only able to feed the East African market but the world market as we have enough fish. There is no need for fish from outside,” he continues to point out.
Back at the Beach, one can observe that there is minimal movement as compared to other times and even as many would attribute this to the advice by the Ministry of Health and the World Health Organization (WHO), Mary Achieng’, one of the fishmongers says that this has also been contributed by the trust that people now have.
Benard Oluoch, a fish trader at Dunga Beach weighs fish for sale at the shores of Lake Victoria. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
“Initially, people would come to the lake to actually buy from us here and make sure that the fish we give them is the real fish that is gotten from the Lake. Now, they know there is no Chinese fish, so they will just comfortably buy from the market or have it delivered to their homes,” she says.
Fishermen and fish traders crowd around a boat that just docked early morning bringing ashore the night’s catch. Credit: Dominic Kirui / Ubuntu Times
As for Odhiambo and her colleagues at Dunga Beach, their prayer is that things will remain this way so that they can be able to fend for their families even after the coronavirus is gone and things come back to normal.
“I just appeal to the government to stop the importation of Chinese fish. We have no other jobs and fully depend on this one. If the government is mindful enough of our future, it will stop the Chinese fish imports because we have enough fish to feed the country,” Odhiambo concludes.
BUDALANGI April 5, 2020 — For 54-year-old Esther Anyango, who resides in Maduwa village nestled in the swampy Yala, an island within the Lake Victoria waters is not her choice.
“This time, the waters are too much to bear. This is different from the other floods,” she tells Ubuntu Times in an interview, speaking through a translator, referring to the ongoing flooding in Budalangi, a region that sits on the shores of Lake Victoria.
It has never been Anyango’s delight to endure floods that happen in her village almost every year. Those financially okay, she says, have relocated and established their new residences in much safe land, mostly Bunyala north.
A mother of six, Anyango’s family is one of hundreds displaced due to the ongoing flooding in Budalangi, which experts say is much due to rising water levels at Lake Victoria.
As of March 28, close to 500 families were reportedly affected by flooding, forcing them to seek refuge on safer raised grounds.
Of concern to Anyango and thousands of residents here is how they will balance having to practice self-distancing and handwashing using clean water or sanitizers, now that they have their homes submerged.
“Toilets have been submerged in floodwater. The water is now contaminated and soon, we are foreseeing a cholera outbreak and other water-borne diseases. To worsen it, families are forced to share single rooms in safer places,” Elijah Wanjala, a resident of Mabinju told Ubuntu Times in an interview.
In its Eastern Africa regional flood snapshot for November last year, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) said over 2.8 million people had been affected by the floods.
The floods, which came in the back of consecutive droughts triggered flooding and landslides across the region, destroying homes, infrastructure and livelihoods, and the risk of communicable diseases — including cholera.
In Kenya’s western region, as floodwaters stagnate, potential threats of a water-borne disease outbreak is imminent, threatening to jeopardize the government’s efforts in containing the spread of coronavirus pandemic.
A spot check at one of the trading centers saw businesses brought to a halt, with few remaining shops staring at a possible total closure as the floodwaters continue to occupy the surrounding.
Raphael Wanjala, a Member of Parliament for Budalangi constituency, told Ubuntu Times in a telephone interview that the ongoing floods are likely to complicate the government’s efforts to combat coronavirus spread.
A woman with her children is spotted outside her submerged homestead with few belongings. Ongoing floods have caused residents to flee to safer grounds in Budalangi. Credit: Robert Kibet / Ubuntu Times
“The flooding threatens to sink the people of Budalangi into deeper poverty. One of the biggest concerns will be managing overcrowding in safety camps where families affected by the raging floods seek refuge,” says Wanjala.
Plagued by heavy rain and flooding over the last few months, with the February flooding leaving 40 dead and 15,000 people displaced, Tanzanian authorities had to order at least 25,000 people to evacuate to safer grounds.
This was after Nyumba ya Mungu dam, located in Mwanga district in the northern Kilimanjaro region, showed signs of breaking due to rising water levels.
Last month, roads in and around the commercial capital, Dar es Salaam were closed due to heavy rains, with a bridge in Kilosa district on the important Morogoro-Dodoma highway collapsing.
A March report by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) indicates that torrential rains caused damage in Mutimbuzi and Kabezi communes in Burundi’s Bujumbura rural province and Nyanza-Lac in Makamba province resulting in two deaths and over 300 people displaced from their homes
Other provinces affected by the torrential rains in Burundi include Rumonge, Gitega and Ruyigi provinces.
The unusual torrential rainfall witnessed in most countries of the East African region within the last quarter of last year, were said to be primarily been driven by the positive Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD)-an irregular oscillation of sea surface temperatures in which the western Indian Ocean becomes alternately warmer (positive phase) and then colder (negative phase) than the eastern part of the ocean.
Budalangi in Kenya, currently witnessing floods is home to a multi-million Bunyala rice irrigation scheme, with fears emerging that continued flooding will disrupt jobs and food security given the timing of the floods which come at the time of planting season.
A child is seen sleeping outside a grass-thatched mud-walled house in Runyu village as Lake Victoria’s backflow water cause havoc in Budalangi constituency. Credit: Robert Kibet / Ubuntu Times
Leaders say the sudden rising water levels in Lake Victoria could have been occasioned by neighboring Ugandan government’s decision to let off water from its Jinja dam through Kiira and Nalubaale powers stations spillways into the River Nile.
For residents living in villages within the Yala swamp, accessing medical services is a tedious exercise, with the nearest health center located in Osieko, several miles away
“People here live by the mercies of God. For them to access medical care, they have to sail a boat far away. With floods causing havoc, the situation is worsened,” says Collins Ayango, a water and beverage consultant from the region, who is in the process of putting up water treatment and bottling plant, seeking to solve the problem of access to clean portable water for the region’s residents.
Uganda and Kenya are part of the countries that signed the 2010 Cooperative Framework Agreement that allows the development of projects along the Nile without approval from Egypt. Under the framework, the River Nile Basin Commission was established to act as a forum for co-operation and a clearinghouse for the planned measures that could cause any harm to other riparian states.
Collins Ayango told Ubuntu Times that lack of political goodwill in the implementation of infrastructural projects, including building reliable dykes on the River Nzoia that empties its water to Lake Victoria used to contribute to annual floods in Budalangi.
“Until when the World Bank funded construction of concrete dykes few years ago, residents used to witness fatal flooding. The ongoing floods look different from the past. It seems it is being caused by the lake’s backflow,” he says.
Some of the vastly affected areas in Budalangi include Osieko, Maduwa, Bukhuma, Bulwani, Iyanga, Rukala, Runyu, Bubamba. Others are Kholokhongo, Mabinju, Musoma, Rugunya, Omena Beach and Buongo villages.
LILONGWE, Malawi — At the age of 94, Malawi’s widower Kenneth Banda resides alone at his aging rural home — a thatched kitchen hut and a two-roomed house roofed with cracked aging asbestos sheets, his home located in Mzimba, Malawi’s remote district north of the country.
In Mangochi rural district, south of Malawi, also lives 83-year old Maria Tembwa, with her six great-grandchildren at a home consisting of two thatched huts — one a bedroom and the other a kitchen.
According to Tembwa, all her 11 children died — some succumbing to AIDS while some of her grandchildren later left for the cities and to neighboring countries in search of greener pastures, leaving her with their children to look after — her great-grandchildren.
But, equally poor as Banda, Tembwa has no money to take care of the young children left under her guardianship.
Malawi’s aged persons like Banda and Tembwa have no access to government social grants.
Yet, laden with a population of about 19 million people, the government of Malawi estimates that 52.4 percent of its population lives below the poverty line of 1 USD per day.
Eight percent of Malawi’s population comprise of the aged persons whose ages range from 60 years and above, according to Help Age International, a global network of NGOs working to promote the rights of older people.
93-year old Bernard Shumba, a resident of Mabvuku high-density suburb in Harare, the country’s capital, has found poverty to be part of his life, adjusting to the challenge which has apparently hit many old persons in Southern Africa. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
In Zimbabwe, the likes of 93-year old Bernard Shumba, a resident of Mabvuku high-density suburb in Harare, the country’s capital, have found poverty part of them.
“I have accepted my fate, that I’m poor and there is no one from government who stands up to support people like myself, people who are very old,” Shumba told Ubuntu Times.
In Zimbabwe, the elderly like Shumba account for about six percent of the country’s estimated population of 16 million, according to Help Age Zimbabwe, a leading organization catering to the needs of senior citizens.
As such, in Zimbabwe, there are an estimated 760,000 older persons.
Together with his 85-year old wife, Tendai, Shumba depends on handouts from good Samaritans, this as the aged couple lives with six of their orphaned jobless great-grandchildren.
Although Shumba worked as a policeman before his country gained independence in 1980, his pension earnings have over the years been eroded by Zimbabwe’s inflation, which hovers around 300 percent, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) last year.
With Southern African countries like Zimbabwe faced with fledgling economies, aged persons like Shumba and his wife have become the victims.
Their great-grandchildren have had to drop out of school because their aged breadwinners can’t cope with the country’s spiraling rate of inflation.
In fact, Zimbabwe’s aged persons have fast become charity cases in the face of the country’s comatose economy and therefore well-wishers have turned into saviors for geriatrics like Shumba and his wife.
An unidentified older man doing his own laundry in some high-density area in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare at a time Southern Africa faces a situation of poverty for its older persons. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Nevertheless, Shumba and his wife have sunken deeper and deeper into poverty, with Shumba having failed to land even a single formal job since four decades ago, save for the informal jobs he obtained every now and then on contractual basis at various private security companies until he called quit three decades ago.
Nonetheless, only nostalgia places a smile on his face.
“We had a good life with my wife when I worked for various security companies, but I have obtained nothing in terms of pension benefits from the companies. It’s worse now because our government hardly supports aged persons,” Shumba said.
Jonathan Mandaza, chairperson of the Zimbabwe Older Persons Organization said ‘abuse of the elderly in Zimbabwe is rampant, adding it includes neglect by the government, which deepens their poverty.’
Meanwhile, in South Africa, the maximum amount paid to aged persons is R1,780 per month, an equivalent of 100 USD monthly per head monthly. If one is older than 75 years, he or she gets R1,800, just a few cents above 100 USD.
But, even this cannot suffice, according to Help Age International, an organization supporting the cause of aged persons.
“Older persons receiving the old age grant in South Africa actually become breadwinners and that has its own challenges,” said an official from Help Age International in South Africa, on condition of anonymity as she was unauthorized to speak to the media.
In Malawi, home to aged persons like Banda and Tembwa, the poverty struggle continues for the aged population.
Xiluva Tambwe, a member of the Malawi Network for Older Persons Organisations (MANEPO) said ‘the elderly have been going through increased socio-economic hardships.’
“One has to know that as in many African cultures, the elderly in Malawi used to depend on the economic and social support of their children and the community, which is rarely the case these days as economic hardships pound everyone,” Tambwe told Ubuntu Times.
Malawi’s human rights activists like John Kasangula have said ‘old-age poverty in Malawi stems from its intergenerational transmission.’
Like the unidentified older woman shown in the photo in Zimbabwe, many Southern African aged persons are having to go about their day-to-day errands and chores without help, having to bear their burdens single-handedly. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
According to the Commonwealth Association for the Ageing, many Malawians spend their later years marginalized from family and community life and as such, growing old in that country comes with new challenges, of which poverty is one of them.
Yet, poverty hammers Southern Africa’s aged populations even as social protection is a basic human right, according to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
In Swaziland, with a population of about 1.3 million people, just three years ago there were reports that over 80 percent of women in the dynastic nation between the ages of 60 and above as well as 70 percent men, were living in poverty amid reports government had run out of money to pay out old age social grants.
Meanwhile, even as poverty roasts Swaziland’s elderly persons and the other chunk of the country’s population, King Mswati there has 13 palaces and lives a lavish lifestyle, having a fleet of top-of-the-range cars, these added to a private jet.
In Angola, one of Africa’s most resource-rich countries representing sub-Saharan Africa’s second-largest oil producer and the world’s fourth-largest producer of diamonds, poverty reigns supreme for the aged there amid reports poverty there is lower only among the 15-35 age group than any other group.
Angola’s population is estimated to range between 16 and 18 million people.
In Zambia, just north of Zimbabwe, two years ago, the country’s Ministry of Community Development and Social Services principal community development officer Stephen Chiwele, went on record in the media saying ‘the current pension schemes in Zambia are contributory in nature, meaning most of the people in the informal sector are without pension cover and many of these are older persons.’
As such, due to loss of work and income in old age, households with old people are among the poorest in Zambia, a country with about 17 million people.
CHITUNGWIZA, Zimbabwe — He now moves around with the aid of a wheelchair, himself a common feature now at a shopping center in Chitungwiza, a dormitory town in Zimbabwe, 25 kilometers south-east of Harare, the country’s capital.
But, not so long ago, the 42-year old Gerald Gundani was able-bodied, often leading from the front anti-government protests that took place in his hometown although he has never been a member of any of the country’s political parties.
Now, following a brutal encounter with suspected members of the Zimbabwean military early last year, Gundani has become disabled, both his legs broken.
Even after he reported to police his encounter with the alleged soldiers, no arrests have been made over one year down the line.
“Life will never be the same for me again; soldiers actually seized me from my home in front of my wife and children; they beat me so badly for days at a place I still don’t know, leaving me with broken legs,” Gundani told Ubuntu Times.
A demonstrator with members of the civil service readying for protests against government as they are demanding better wages. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
He (Gundani) was part of a group of protesters that took to the streets in January last year after the government hiked fuel prices by over 150 percent.
Then, the protesters comprising ordinary citizens and a blend of opposition political activists burnt tires and blockaded roads with rocks in protest against government decision to hike fuel prices.
The demonstrations that resulted in many casualties like Gundani, forced the country’s security forces to fire live ammunition at them (the demonstrators), killing 17 people amid reports that about 17 women were also raped during the military crackdown.
Gundani is merely one of many Zimbabweans that have been victimized by the country’s notorious security agents despite Section 59 of the country’s Constitution allowing people like him to demonstrate.
In fact, some 50 Zimbabweans, primarily political opponents and union leaders, have been kidnapped in Zimbabwe in 2019 alone, according to Human Rights Watch, a global organization that investigates and reports on abuses happening in all corners of the world.
Police donning riot gear get ready to thwart a demonstration by Zimbabwe’s civil servants in Harare, the Zimbabwean capital. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Gundani has been amongst these at a time the country’s security forces stand out widely accused of perpetrating rights abuses.
With the country’s security forces apparently keen to crush any anti-government protests, even as the country’s leaders brag about honoring human rights here, anti-government marches are fast fading into oblivion, according to civil society leaders here.
“People are now living in fear and with soldiers and police always on the lookout for any anti-government protests, marches or gatherings, I can tell you such rights are fast melting away,” Claris Madhuku, director of the Platform for Youth Development Trust, told Ubuntu Times.
Just earlier this year, as anti-government protesters prepared to storm the streets in memory of the 17 demonstrators murdered by police and soldiers last year, police in riot gear armed with baton sticks and teargas canisters, descended on the marchers, beating them randomly, injuring many in the process.
Now, even for Zimbabwe’s ordinary imbibers like 36-year old Thomas Mupandutsi based in Chitungwiza’s Seke area, people like him have become objects of state repression as well.
“These days it has become common for soldiers to storm bars or nightclubs beating people for no apparent reasons, often telling people to just go home,” Mupandutsi told Ubuntu Times.
Riot police in the Zimbabwean capital Harare, stand in the middle of the road as they bar protesters from demonstrating against government authorities. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
On 01 August 2018, soon after Zimbabwe’s first election without former President Robert Mugabe contesting, soldiers shot and killed six civilians after protesters stormed the streets demanding the release of the presidential election results.
Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa ordered a Commission of Inquiry to probe the military violations.
However, to this day even as the Motlanthe Commission completed its findings and ordered soldiers accused of perpetrating the rights abuses to be investigated and prosecuted, nothing has happened.
Instead, many Zimbabweans like Gundani have had to continue nursing indelible wounds of state repression, living in fear.
So, as rights abuse continues in Zimbabwe, even comedians have not been spared, with their comics perceived as hostile to the country’s political leaders.
Opposition political activists in Zimbabwe backing the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), gather at Africa Unity Square in Harare in readiness to stage protests against government. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Such are females like Samantha Kureya, better known as Gonyeti.
“At one time after I was kidnapped by members of the secret police; I was told straight away that I was too young to ridicule the government and accused of being paid to mock the government,” said Kureya.
She (Kureya) is one of many Zimbabwean comedians who have clashed with authorities for her anti-government theatrics.
And so for her and many other comedians, as Zimbabwe’s security agents scale up rights abuses, it is no joke being a comedian in Zimbabwe.
“Honestly, we are citizens of a country where politics is the order of the day and therefore when people in authority do bad things, as comedians, we speak out, but unfortunately as a result, we then become enemies of the state,” another comedian known as Prosper Ngomashi, better known as Comic Pastor, told Ubuntu Times.
Hordes of opposition political activists coming from Zimbabwe’s opposition Movement for Democratic Alliance party, throng Africa Unity Square in Harare the Zimbabwean capital awaiting a signal to march in protest against Mr. Emmerson Mnangagwa’s failed government in Zimbabwe. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Yet, for ordinary Zimbabweans, as known people like Kureya and Ngomashi fall prey to rights abuse, people’s fears are worse off.
“As an average citizen, I now fear to express myself because I have seen worse things happening to very popular individuals, celebrities in fact, who oppose government,” Prichard Muhaka, a 30-year old street vendor hawking sweets and cigarettes in Harare, told Ubuntu Times.
Just last year alone, in Zimbabwe, twenty people were charged with treason under Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa, according to rights defenders.
According to the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, which has handled most of the cases, the number of people charged with treason, which carries a death penalty here, rose to 20 in less than a year since Mnangagwa came to power.
Showing a whipped back in a hospital bed last year, Patson Dzamara apparently looks dejected after brutal encounter at the hands of some secret cops. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Yet, even to this day, cases of human rights violations are escalating in the Southern African nation, this according to the January 2020 monthly report by human rights watchdog, the Zimbabwe Peace Project (ZPP).
“The month of January 2020 saw an increase in reported human rights violations from 119 to 185. Harassment and intimidation were the highest recorded violations at 96. Mashonaland Central province recorded the highest violations at 34,” said ZPP in its latest report.
Rattled by Zimbabwe’s human rights abuses, the UN’s outgoing coordinator in Zimbabwe, Bishaw Parajuli last year called on the country’s government to bring to justice perpetrators of human rights violations although nothing of the sort has taken place.
Dadaab, Kenya March 9 — It’s Friday evening and as the sun sets, a group of women refugees converge at Dagahley settlement block inside Dadaab Refugee Camp.
They are converging for their regular group radio listening sessions where they exchange information on women’s rights and advocacy skills.
Emerging from different directions inside the refugee camp, some of the women are carrying sitting mats, others portable radios to be used during the special radio session, while others are sharing excitedly experiences they went through loudly as they take their positions at the venue of their meeting.
Suddenly, the women group leader brings the session to order and introduces the evening radio topic to her colleagues numbering 45 before the session starts.
Each evening a new set of women participants attend the sessions who include victims of rape, sexual exploitation, gender-based violence, early child marriage or female genital mutilation. They operate under the Somali Women Refugee Radio Listening Project.
Most of the women participants have in one way or the other suffered different human rights violations in the camp. Their cases were handled through a traditional justice system established by elders at the refugee camp who hear the cases before determining them and imposing unjust fines thus denying the victims justice and shielding the perpetrators from facing the law.
Rehabilitated ex-traditional circumcisers participating in radio listening group session in Dadaab refugee camp, Northern Kenya. Credit: Abjata Khalif / Ubuntu Times
Dagahaley camp is one of the four settlements located inside Dadaab Refugee Camp billed as the world’s largest refugee camp that hosts an estimated 640,000 refugees from conflict-hit countries of Somalia, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Uganda and Ethiopia with majority fleeing from war-torn neighboring Somalia.
Before the radio listening session starts, women refugee rights activists share their advocacy campaigns and the challenges they face within their respective refugee settlement blocks and then introduce any women and girl’s victims of rape, sexual exploitation, gender-based violence, early child marriage or Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), to the group.
On this particular Friday radio listening session, a refugee women activist Mrs. Asha Ahmed, introduce a girl who was raped by a group of youths in one of the settlement blocks at the refugee camp.
Mrs. Ahmed reveals that the rape victim’s parents decided not to bring the issue to the attention of law enforcement officers at the camp and instead accepted two goats from parents of the alleged rapist as fine or compensation for the offense committed by their son who was accompanied by others in the barbaric act.
The case was picked up by women refugee rights defenders operating under the Somali Women Refugee Radio Listening Project who convinced the victim’s parents to seek justice and honor for their daughter.
The parent agreed and the case was reported to the Dadaab Refugee Camp police unit and the suspect was apprehended and charged before a mobile court that offers judicial services in the refugee tower.
Women radio listening members listen to a radio program on reporting rape cases and other gender-based violence in Dadaab refugee camp, Northern Kenya. Credit: Abjata Khalif / Ubuntu Times
“First it was hard to convince the victim’s parents to return the two goats and report the matter to the nearest police station, but they eventually agreed after we enlightened and assured them,” Mrs. Ahmed a women refugee rights defender at the camp says.
The women refugee radio listeners heard from the refugee rights defenders that more women refugees need to be reached and given education and other support for them to shun the traditional Somali justice system and report human rights violations to the police promptly.
Mrs. Ahmed told the radio sessions listeners that concealing rape, sexual exploitation, gender-based violence, early child marriage or female genital mutilation was unacceptable and such cases should not be handled through the traditional Somali justice system but within the purview of the Kenyan law.
“Many women and girls whose rights have been violated in the refugee camp have failed to get justice due to unjust judgments made by traditional Somali justice system,” she noted.
Every new women radio listening group members at the refugee camp establish their own women radio group which is coordinated and supported by Somali Women Radio Listening Group Project.
The rape victim whose case had been taken over by the Somali Women Radio Listening Group Project went through a comprehensive training to equip her with skills to be able to agitate for the rights of other girls in her refugee settlement block.
“We believe through this initiative we are going to reach out to more women and girls who are victims of sexual violence, those subjected to early marriages and are threatened with Female Genital Mutilation (FGM),’’ Mrs. Ahmed observed.
So far the Somali Women Radio Listening Group Project has reached out to 45,000 women refugees and 3,400 women and girls victims of sexual violence and 4,500 victims of outdated cultural practices within Dadaab refuge tower.
Women radio listening audience participating in radio listening and feedback sessions in Dadaab village, Northern Kenya. Credit: Abjata Khalif / Ubuntu Times
The Somali Women Radio Listening Group Project leader, Mrs. Muslima Hassan, took new women refugee members through an orientation exercise on the kind of advocacy expected from them in their respective refugee settlement blocks.
After the induction, the radio listening sessions start with a pre-recorded radio program on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) aired through a portable radio using a removable device containing the program which was recorded in a local radio station within Dadaab Refugee Camp.
The pre-recorded program is a 20-minutes radio feature story giving in-depth coverage of the practice within the camp and containing voices and advice from health, religious and community leaders, parents and women victims of FGM.
Ten minutes into the radio listening session several women refugees engage each other in low tones with others grimacing from the facts and information they received on the danger of FGM on young girls and women who have already undergone it.
Medical experts detailed the health dangers associated with the practice while religious leaders emphasized that the practice was not sanctioned and supported by Islamic faith thus parents should not conform to it blindly as it was un-Islamic.
Strongest voices and confessions came from girls and women victims of the practice who narrated how they now live with lifetime scars, with one FGM victim claiming she is experiencing difficulties in giving birth due to pain and injuries to her genitalia.
One parent revealed during the sessions that she lost her daughter to FGM following excessive bleeding after the exercise was performed on her by inexperienced traditional circumcisers.
Women radio listeners preparing their solar-powered radio for radio listening program on women’s rights. Credit: Abjata Khalif / Ubuntu Times
During the radio sessions, a middle-aged woman claimed that she was divorced by her husband due to persistent pain she developed after undergoing FGM. She revealed that she started experiencing pain while having sex with her husband a development that made her hate sex resulting in her being divorced.
She added that she had been forced to turn down several men who approached her for marriage after her divorce due to fear of pain during sex as she has visited several hospitals for assistance without success.
Her radio testimony ended with a call for communities and parents to shun Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) saying she is suffering due to permanent injuries from it.
During the heated discussions, it emerged that many women did not know that FGM was not supported by Islam and was meant to stop girls from engaging in promiscuity.
The majority of participants were not aware of the health complications caused by FGM and the health and psychological impact on girls and women.
To most of them, FGM is an outdated cultural practice that should be shunned by all women and the Somali Women Radio Listening Group Project is a panacea that had brought change in their lives.
GOKWE, Zimbabwe — A one-room home structure made of poles plastered with mud, roofed with a single zinc sheet, with a gaping wooden door stands side by side with a thatched kitchen hut, also made of poles plastered with mud.
46-year old Denford Chagwiza calls this home, where he lives with his family, the children each evening converting the kitchen hut into a bedroom.
This is in Gokwe, in Zimbabwe’s Midlands Province.
In Harare, 25 kilometers east of the Zimbabwean capital, lies Epworth, an urban settlement where 42-year old Hebert Nhari’s two-roomed cabin home, made from planks, is located.
An aging thatched kitchen hut side by side with an equally aging house plastered with cement in a village called Sidakeni in rural Gokwe in Zimbabwe’s Midlands Province. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Here, Nhari dwells with his wife and five children.
Chagwiza and Nhari epitomize Zimbabwe’s grinding rural and urban poverty.
“This has been my life over the years and we have become used to it. Food is our daily struggle because crop yields are always poor, owing to droughts,” Chagwiza told Ubuntu Times.
Although Zimbabwe’s cities have been in the past not known to be infested with poverty, many like Nhari have not been spared by the poverty scourge in the country’s urban areas — the same headache for Gokwe’s Chagwiza.
Amid grinding poverty in Zimbabwe’s towns and cities, slums have become a common trend in Epworth, an urban informal settlement, 25 km east of the Zimbabwean capital Harare. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
“I live in this cabin with my family and even if it rains we have nowhere to run to because this is our home; I have no job and together with my wife and children at times we get casual jobs to support ourselves,” Nhari told Ubuntu Times.
Even as he is domiciled in the country’s capital city, like Chagwiza’s, Nhari’s children are all school dropouts and they have to spend much of their time idly roaming around their homes’ vicinities.
So, in essence, with poverty-stricken citizens like Nhari and Chagwiza, independent development experts like Jimson Gandari say ‘Zimbabwe now teams with rural and urban poverty.’
A rural home made up of a single thatched hut built using wood in Makoni, a remote district in Zimbabwe’s Mashonaland Central Province. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
According to the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), more than 90 percent of this country’s approximately 16 million people are unemployed.
Formed in 1981 through the merger of six trade union centers, ZCTU is the primary trade union federation in this Southern African nation.
For civil society activists like Catherine Mkwapati, ‘unlike in the previous years, poverty in Zimbabwe’s rural and urban areas have become common.’
A rather squashed village with a mixture of thatched huts fenced with grass and other home structures poorly roofed with zinc sheets, in Makoni, a district in Zimbabwe’s Mashonaland Central Province. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
“You can’t tell the difference now; on one hand when you come to Zimbabwe’s town, you are met with slums, even thatched slums and on the other hand when you go to the countryside, you meet similar structures — signs of poverty,” Mkwapati told Ubuntu Times.
Mkwapati is the director for the Youth Dialogue Action Network, a Zimbabwean civil society organization.
According to the Poverty Reduction Forum Trust (PRFT), emerging trends show that poverty in both rural and urban areas here is shooting up.
“Urban poverty has turned to be an emerging reality in Zimbabwe in recent years, but also remains more widespread in the rural areas, with rural and urban household poverty statistics approximately standing at 76 percent and 38 percent respectively,” Judith Kaulem, director at PRFT, told Ubuntu Times.
A single thatched hut home built from stones and rocks plastered with mud, standing opposite bundles of spare grass to re-thatch the home, in Makoni district in Zimbabwe’s Mashonaland Central Province. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
Founded in 2008 and inspired by the vision of a Zimbabwe Free from Poverty in which every human being lives a dignified, secure and decent life that conduce sustainable human development, PRFT is a civil society organization which seeks to influence the formulation of ‘pro-poor’ policies by conducting research on poverty-related issues and engaging with policymakers.
For Zimbabwe’s rural dwellers like Chagwiza, according to PRFT’s Kaulem, ‘lack of food security and lack of sustained income opportunities in the face of climate change remain key livelihood challenges being faced by the rural poor.’
But, with joblessness haunting urban dwellers like Nhari, Kaulem also said poverty was now an equal menace to Zimbabwe’s rural and urban dwellers.
However, said Kaulem, ‘as statistics show even now, it’s the rural dwellers still suffering most at the hands of poverty.’
To her (Kaulem), ‘poor access to basic services such as food, health, transport, water and sanitation greatly affects the lives of women and children in rural areas.’
“With above 70 percent of Zimbabweans living in rural areas and heavily dependent on agriculture, it remains very important to invest in evidence-based approach to improve rural livelihoods and access social services by all layers of the society,” Kaulem told Ubuntu Times.
In Zimbabwe, inflation hovers above 300 percent, based on statistics from the International Monetary Fund last year.
In the Zimbabwean capital Harare’s Mabvuku-Tafara high-density suburb, makeshift homes have become common as urban dwellers battle to contain mounting poverty, with some even pitching tents as homes. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
This, many rural and urban dwellers like Chagwiza and Nhari, have had to contend with, but in vain, and so according to civil society activists like Owen Dhliwayo, ‘poverty lampoons the poor in Zimbabwe from left, right and center whether in cities or villages.’
He (Dhliwayo) is a program officer for the Youth Dialogue Action Network.
Now, as Zimbabwe’s economy teeters on the brink of collapse amid growing urban and rural poverty, civil society activists like Dhliwayo have warned that ‘soon there would be no sanctuary for the country’s rural or urban dwellers.’
Nutritionists like Melody Charakupa working for a top non-governmental organization in Harare said ‘whether in rural or urban areas, challenges like malnutrition have become Zimbabwe’s new foes to contend with.’
In fact, by last year, the UN agency had already piloted a food assistance program in many Zimbabwean poor urban spots like Epworth, home to many like Nhari, one of Harare’s poorest high-density settlements, feeding over 20,000 residents.
As things stand, according to official numbers from the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency’s Poverty Income, Consumption and Expenditure Survey, an estimated 76 percent of Zimbabwe’s rural households are poor, while 23 percent are deemed extremely poor.
Yet, in reality, rural households have been the worst affected by poverty in comparison to urban households — pegged at 76 percent rural and 38 percent urban households.
A derelict isolated house in the village with peeling off cement-plastered walls in Gokwe in Zimbabwe’s Midlands Province. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo / Ubuntu Times
The current Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment Committee Report has said the number of food-insecure people here last year was projected at 28 percent; apparently, 2.4 million people who were unable to meet their food needs as to the completion of the consumption year last year.
Consequently, the Zimbabwean government last year went on record in the media claiming
that 7.5 million people or half the population would be food-insecure, whether in rural or urban areas.
Yet, the food question is not the only hurdle facing Zimbabweans — accommodation is another headache either in rural or urban areas.
An estimated one in four of Zimbabwe’s urban population, or about 1.25 million people, live in slums, according to the 2014 United Nations data, with the World Bank estimating that Zimbabwe’s urban population, currently numbering about 5 million people, is increasing by two percent annually.
In fact, for many Zimbabwean rural and urban dwellers like Chagwiza and Nhari, living conditions are horrendous, with many of the dwellings built entirely of grass.
According to the UN, a combination of drought and economic demise by last year left 7.7 million Zimbabweans like Chagwiza and Nhari — approximately half the population — hunger-stricken.
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