In wake of last week’s International Women’s Day, I thought it would be interesting to see how women’s rights are acknowledged in Namibia. It was fitting that on March 12, a journalist from the Namibian discussed the matter in an interesting article titled, “Progress for women so near, yet so far.” (Namibia celebrates International Women’s Day on March 8th every year)
For want of context, the way many celebrated International Women’s Day in the United States was by turning to social media. Posts about strong women friends, incredible woman family members, and inspiring women in history littered our Facebook feeds, and many a Snapchat were taken with the IWD filter. Backing up all the outward social media displays of support, women’s marches happened around the country, and many public figures used their platforms to discuss the gendered disparities happening to this day.
But in all the hubbub of celebrating IWD in America, many of us forget about the varying women’s rights movements happening in countries across the world— including Namibia. The author of the Namibian article, Nomhle Kangootui, notes that women’s rights vary vastly depending on where you are in the country: rural, urban, or otherwise. She notes that those located in “informal areas” do not get the same type of “woman empowerment” that is written down on paper by government bodies.
A Namibian kindergarten owner, Josephine Nelenge-Ingashipwa, states, “For now, I think they [the government] only talk. We currently do not feel the 'women's empowerment' people are talking about, and instead we must look and depend on foreign help.” Disparities in gender are thus reinforced by disparities in geographic location.
An interesting part of Kangootui’s article was when she mentioned a female government figure’s response to women’s roles:
“Meanwhile, to commemorate the day, deputy prime minister and minister of international relations and cooperation Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah said at a networking breakfast held in the capital last week that women should be strategic and persistent. In that way, they can achieve without disrupting anything.”
By mentioning that women had to be strategic “without disrupting anything,” it speaks to the outward, cultural allowance for women’s roles in Namibia. I think the journalist’s main issue with governmental responses is that they make claims for acceptance of woman empowerment, but in implementation confine Namibian women into small boxes.
The article was an interesting look into how a Namibian woman views gender inequalities in her home country. And though the Namibian government claims that the main gender disparities are actually narrowing, testimonials from people in rural Namibia say otherwise. Because our trip will be in mostly empty and rural parts of Namibia, I would be curious to look more into these women’s rights issues as they pertain to rural people, rather than urban city centers.
~Elizabeth
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