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Ruth Butaumocho Gender Forum
MEETING the deputy chairperson of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission Joyce Laetitia Kazembe for the first time at a women’s forum in Harare recently was indeed an enriching experience that gave me an insight into how the gender discourse has been handled in Zimbabwe in the last two decades.

As I sat across her, I was struck by her poignant but hard hitting chronology of Zimbabwe’s tragedy in trying to address gender equality issues in the last two decades.
She was talking about a struggle in which she took part, where her passion lay and her undying commitment towards women’s emancipation.

Speaking passionately on the gender discourse in Zimbabwe and Africa at large, participants noted that her understanding of gender inequality in the country was not at a superficial level, or that of an academic being paid to do her job, but it was a deep-seated passion inspired by her wish to see the emancipation of women.

As she explained how the gender discourse has evolved over the years, it was clear that the same issues that hogged the limelight more than two decades ago are still the same issues that the country is battling today.

According to her, what may have changed over the years are not the issues surrounding gender, but venues for the conferences, the eloquence of the speakers and probably the semantics that are now being used to articulate the same issues.

New schools of thoughts, different methodologies in research and in some instances accelerated funding may have emerged as the new modus operandi here, but again the gender issues that resulted in thousands of women and men converging in China at the 1995 women world conference, now commonly referred to as the “Beijing Conference”, remain the same.

Mrs Kazembe shared her experience of the first women’s conference that she attended in 1985 in Nairobi, where women and other activists campaigned vigorously for the recognition of women as equal beings in all spheres of life. She recalled marching in the streets of Nairobi so full of life, very energetic, together with thousands of women and men from across the globe, who wanted women’s issues to be regarded as everyone’s issues.

The march she participated in and many others that were held before in Mexico City (1975), Copenhagen (1980), Nairobi (1985) and later Beijing (1995), were all podiums that were created to come up with ways to address gender inequality across the globe.

At all these conferences, women came from all over the world, learnt from each other and formed networks and political alliances on behalf of fellow women.

During all these conferences, they agreed that women’s rights needed to be recognised as human rights, as clearly stated in the Beijing Platform for Action.

Mrs Kazembe recalls that the word gender was challenged in Nairobi by some countries that did not see women and men as equal human beings but as necessarily different sexes with fixed social roles.

Although I was not there, having been in high school then, I am sure among the countries was Saudi Arabia, which up to now does not allow women to drive a car because they are not regarded as equal to men.

I dared not asked Mrs Kazembe how old she was in 1985, but as I looked her, with most of her hair now grey, I could tell that her fight for women’s emancipation has been an arduous and winding journey.

Surprisingly enough, she remains convinced that the war for emancipation of women can still be won.

So what Mrs Kazembe was saying was that despite decades of assumed feminist advances, women are still far behind in terms of achieving gender parity.

What was clear during her presentation was that the fight for gender equality does not need many conferences, huge crowds and nicely crafted presentations from world renowned orators to articulate gender issues that are known world over.

It does take political will and individual reflections and decisions on how they would want their women to be treated.
She firmly believes that the solutions to our problems lie in our communities and amongst our people.

Zimbabwe has acceded to various treaties, commitments and international laws in our existing pieces of legislation including the constitution. However, the irony is that women still suffer considerable discrimination.

There still exist double standards regarding gender equality — legislation is there, adapted and contextualised to suit our own situation as Zimbabwe, taking into consideration the issues of socialisation, the growing women population and other factors.

The majority of women in business in Zimbabwe will attest that gender discrimination is most felt when one wants to venture in business — in any sector.

Even after they have gone through the hassles of setting up a business, women entrepreneurs have to overcome more obstacles in organising and expanding their business than men.

One of the major difficulties they face is having themselves and their businesses taken seriously, as well as getting men to work for them.
There are reportedly many cases of “concealed” but real discrimination against businesswomen by creditors, suppliers and customers.

Men dominate all business associations and are often less than friendly towards female entrepreneurs in their field, women entrepreneurs attest.

So what Mrs Kazembe was saying was that despite decades of assumed feminist advances, women are still far behind in terms of achieving gender parity.

There are notable achievements that have been made over the years in areas of education, opening up of employment opportunities in technical areas, once regarded as the preserve of men.

But there are a lot grey areas that have not been addressed. Most notably, the number of women in corporate leadership is disproportionately low, and so is the number of female political leaders.

All this can change overnight if our communities and individuals make a commitment to treat women and men as equals, without seeking to undermine each other’s societal and biological obligations.