Major role for women graduates Dr Naomi Nhiwatiwa

The Herald, 15 May 1981

IF Zimbabwe’s women graduates ever doubted their worth, they were given ample reassurance of the role they had to play in the country’s future from the Deputy Minister of community Development and Women’s Affairs this week.

Dr Naomi Nhiwatiwa herself a woman of many degrees told Salisbury members of the Zimbabwe Association of University Women that nowhere in history had so much demand been placed on graduate women as in Zimbabwe today.

“Our graduate women have a major role to play in Zimbabwe today,” she told her audience at the University of Zimbabwe.

The Deputy Minister was speaking on the responsibilities of women graduates in the country and she held no punches in delivering them.

“The concept of equality as propagated by our Government can only be actuated and demonstrated by our graduate women,” she said.

“Our Government believes that it is when the women of Zimbabwe are fully participating in national development that we will be able to speak of total, mental, physical and economic independence,”

Women had the depth and understanding of the concept of equality between members of society: they understood the obstacles and advantages of establishing equality between the sexes.

“The graduate women have the responsibility of explaining to others the concept of socialism, the gains that can be attained in such a system,” she said.

“The graduate students should be involved in voluntary activities that will give them the opportunity of testing the theories from their textbooks into real life situations…

“Graduate women should serve as models to others in standing for their rights. They should be the vanguard of the rights of all citizens of Zimbabwe. They should ensure that the rights being propagated by the Government are not only speeches but reality.”

Women graduates should serve as models in employment situations, Dr Nhiwatiwa said, and should not compromise their academic qualifications, skills and mental abilities because they were women.

They had the responsibility of setting the mode of relationship between men and women so that it was not one of inferiority or superiority, but one of equality and friendship.

“It is the graduate woman who should demonstrate that an educated woman is an asset to her husband, to her children and to the society as a whole,” she urged.

With their quick assimilation of situations, women graduates had the responsibility of explaining Government policies to others, and the issues affecting women to the Government, Dr Nhiwatiwa said.

They could play an important role in the changing society: changes in attitudes, changes in the relation between races, tribes and women.

LESSONS FOR TODAY

• Educated women play a critical role in helping improve socio-economic growth in a country.

• The number of women entering our tertiary institutions every has continued to grow each year, and this has resulted in a major ratio between male and female graduates, in favour of women graduates.

• Educating a girl child means empowerment not just for herself, but for everyone in her circle of influence, and that circle is large it includes everyone.

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