RNS – RISE N’ SHINE TRUST

Rise N’ Shine Trust is a non-profit charity in Zimbabwe that works for the arts, education and the environment. Specifically, it is about creating self-chosen and self-determined pathways for young people and women in rural, peripheral and urban areas. Rise N’ Shine believes in the power of education to bring about sustainable change in communities and societies for the future.

Tables of Peace 2023

The Rise N’ Shine Trust is a partner organisation of the Small Grants Initiative 2023.

With the project “Tables of Peace”, RNS advocates for art, education and the environment. Young men come together and address their own role in relation to gender-based violence. Since playing billiards is a frequent pastime for many men from rural areas and small towns, RNS picks up right there, addressing men’s participation on the issue of gender-based violence at pool tables.

Emergency aid in the crisis area Cabo Delgado

The crisis in the region is not over yet. fepa has, however, completed the emergency aid. Together with the local partner:organisation, we are now committed to a longer-term development perspective with the participation of the population.

Currently

Check out our news page (German) for the latest on this partnership.

Background

Since 2017, the province of Cabo Delgado in northern Mozambique has been plagued by warlike turmoil. The anger and discontent of the population are fuelled by Islamist terrorists and criminal elements. In early 2021, the war reached a climax with the capture of the district capital Palma. In the process, the population was caught between the fronts of state security forces and insurgents. As a result, 700,000 people fled to other districts in the province. The influx of refugees poses a major challenge for the local population around the provincial capital of Pemba.

The causes of the conflict are complex. An important role is played by the large gas deposits that the French company Total wants to exploit with a gigantic gas liquefaction project on the coast off Palma. The project, worth 120 billion US The project, worth 120 billion US dollars, was stopped for security reasons after the attack on Palma. The local population realised that they could expect nothing from the promises. On the contrary, they were driven off their land. There is also a lot going wrong in the area, where illegal gemstone mining and smuggling as well as drug trafficking routes endanger the security of the local people. In addition, there are corrupt government employees who are only interested in self-enrichment.

fepa’s engagement

From 2005 to 2009, fepa carried out a mosquito net project in cooperation with Reiner Bernath, a doctor from Solothurn, in Mocimboa da Praia, near the border with Tanzania, to protect mothers and small children from malaria. Reiner Bernath had been on assignment there as a doctor for the Cabo Delgado Health Directorate and wanted to make an additional contribution after his return. Now the hospital of Mocimboa da Praia has been destroyed and many inhabitants of the formerly peaceful little coastal village have had to flee. Through an acquaintance in Pemba, Reiner Bernath was able to secure direct help for refugees. He contacted fepa again to organise further aid. It became apparent that the arrival of a large number of displaced persons was generating land conflicts with the local population. For this reason, fepa also supports a theatre group, the Associação Cultural Novos Horizontes, which works towards conflict resolution by raising awareness in the districts. Despite the usual difficulties, theatre performances were held in the centres of Mecufi, Montepuez and Ancuabe in front of more than 9,000 spectators.

Art and Society

Cultural practitioners hold up a mirror to society. And art is often also directly a means of civil society work: it can transport information and call for action. We are making a small contribution to raising awareness of the work of artists.

Here is a list of artists we have portrayed:

• Thandoe Sibanda (poet)
• Racheal “Voko “Ncube (poet)
• Tamary Kudita (photographer)
• Jeremy David Ambrose Kupfuwa (photographer)
• Hope Masike (singer, dancer, visual artist, poet)
• Ndomupeishe “Ndomzy” Chipendo (dancer, singer)

Music…

… has long been closely linked to politics. Read here some texts on the specific situation in Zimbabwe.

In the May 2023 journal we published a text by F. D. Mhlanga on this very topic. The author sheds light on the Zimbabwean situation and puts the link between music and politics in a historical context. You can find the full text here.

Politically motivated artists

Thomas Mapfumo

The Zimbabwean Thomas Mapfumo was born in 1945. He showed an interest in traditional music from his early childhood. In 1973, he joined his first band, the Hallelujah Chicken Band. After switching from English to dialect, he used his music to spread calls for freedom. This genre is called chimurenga. It became a symbol of efforts against injustice in war-torn Rhodesia. Around 1978, he formed the band Blacks Unlimited. He continuously spoke out against the colonialist regime, even though he faced censorship and repression from the system. His music spread like wildfire. After Zimbabwe’s declaration of independence in 1980, Mapfumo shared the stage with Bob Marley. This led to his international success. His music was no longer dedicated to the struggle for independence, but to corruption and poverty. Even in the new Zimbabwe, he was not spared censorship and more, so that he finally moved to the USA in 2000. He was able to return to Zimbabwe in 2018 after 14 years in exile.

Winky D

Born in 1983, this singer is known for his music in the Zimdancehall genre. He is considered one of the pioneers of this genre. His songs address social injustice and corruption. He refers to a regime that suppresses freedom of opinion and speech. This is also evident on 4 March 2023, when Winky D was taken off stage by the police during a concert. The stop came after the singer performed the song Ibotso from his latest album. The song addresses the decay and injustices of the country. Despite opposition from the government, the singer has managed to bag a number of awards: most recently Best African Dancehall Entertainer 2023 and Best male artist in South Africa 2023.

Hope Masike

Masike’s music may be a colourful mix of styles, but the sounds of the mbira remain a constant. They have also earned the singer-songwriter the title “Princess of the Mbira”. In her music, she combines traditional and modern and often challenges colonial stigmas. She has collaborated with many artists, including Oliver Mtukudzi. We have already portrayed the multi-talented artist in our newsletter.

Oliver Mtukudzi

Mtukudzi, also known as Tuku, like Mapfumo, also accompanied Zimbabwe through the liberation struggles with his music. His music was a mixture of Afro-jazz, pop and funk. It offered the people at least a temporary distraction in difficult times. In 2007, his music was already interpreted more politically than he wanted. He says of himself that he doesn’t understand anything about politics and doesn’t like to talk about the then President Mugabe.  With excuses like these and his national popularity, he can evade the interrogations of the secret police. He was particularly committed to Zimbabwe during the HIV epidemic. Mtukudzi died in January 2019 at the age of 66.

Women and development

Women* have equal rights as men and contribute to all development processes. That is why the situation of women should be improved.

It is social conditions that give the impression that men play more important roles in improving the world: Since 1901, 90 men and only 17 women have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, and at the WEF, only 24% of the 3,000 invited guests were women.

Development needs gender equality

On the other hand, “gender inequality is one of the greatest obstacles to sustainable development, economic growth and poverty reduction”, as the SDC writes. The UN has therefore made gender equality a goal of the sustainability agenda (Goal 5): “We recognise that gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls make a crucial contribution to progress. Humanity cannot realise its full potential as long as half the people are denied their human rights and opportunities.” Science underpins these political statements.

Economic development: No growth without women

In 1984, the UN presented its first report on the role of women in development. At that time, the focus was still very much on women’s contribution to economic growth. Even then, the UN did not fail to notice that many labour-intensive production processes in the industrial sector were being relocated to the global South. In the special export zones, the share of women in industrial enterprises was often already over 80%. Women would also benefit from these shifts, but the report referred to the need to achieve improvements for women in the industrial sector. At that time, it was also already known that women play a huge role in agriculture and that the promotion of women in the agricultural production environment was therefore not only about gender issues, but also about “growth”. And then the report did not forget to insist on the need to give more weight to women in science and technology as well as in finance in order to strengthen development. Since then, much has happened – and yet somehow too little. Above all, new problems have been recognised. The latest 2019 report, for example, is about the role of women in unpaid work. You can find more on the economic issues here.

Social development

At fepa, however, we do not only believe in the role of women as an economic force. Women’s equality is a prerequisite for peace and dignity and thus also for sustainable development. Only when girls and women are allowed to develop freely and according to their potential in every respect do societies fully prosper.

This is why we have been advocating for women since the early 1960s – as part of our development and peace work. The fact that this work has always been strongly influenced by women is certainly one of the main reasons why fepa has always been sensitive to issues of women’s rights and the advancement of women. You can find out more about fepa and our commitment to women’s issues here. So, because our concept of development is broader than just economic development and growth, we believe that in a whole range of areas women not only have a role to play, but that we need to make important improvements in order to make development truly valuable.

Obstacles to the development of (young) women in Zimbabwe

Roswita Katsande, Director of the Zimbabwean Youth Organisation YETT describes the current situation for women in Zimbabwe thus:

“Women here are seen as responsible for the domestic sphere and are supposed to raise the children.

Young women in urban Zimbabwe encounter many difficulties on a daily basis that stem from an unequal power relationship between the sexes. They stand up for their communities, struggle daily for land, water, jobs and yet face systematic discrimination simply because they are women.

For women, this means sexual and physical violence, fewer opportunities to attend school, higher than average vulnerability to HIV, and lack of access to property and other rights.

Urban poverty is widespread in Zimbabwe and prevents women from accessing health care and education. As unemployment rises, so does violence against women.

Climate change reinforces unfair gender relations. Where there is a lot of poverty, the disadvantage of girls and women often increases. But climate change also has a very direct impact: Water shortages have a particularly strong effect on women and girls, as they bring the water home. The situation has been exacerbated by the nationwide energy crisis, as high fuel prices have led to increased use of firewood, which women also have to search for.

In all this, women have too little say. Where decisions are made in political structures, for example, women remain marginalised.”

Reading tip

Over the years, the discussion has moved from “women and development” to “women in (development) processes” to “gender and development”. Under the latter title, a journal worth reading has existed for 25 years.

Women and Health

All people have a right to health. Good health is important for full enjoyment of life. Illness, on the other hand, is an important risk factor for poverty. [1] This is true for individuals, but also for entire countries that, like Zimbabwe, are suffering from the effects of the HIV epidemic.

Health and Inequality

In Zimbabwe, as in other sub-Saharan countries, women’s health is relatively severely affected: in this context, one speaks of a so-called “health burden”. This burden is strongly influenced by inequality. This is the subject of a report [2] from 2016 with data from many countries in sub-Saharan Africa (including Zimbabwe, for the period 2010-2011). There are great inequalities not only between the sexes, but also between women. These are greatest when it comes to childbirth and pregnancy – across sub-Saharan Africa, only about half of pregnant women receive the most basic medical support. The main factors explaining these inequalities are level of education, financial situation, and place of residence, or accessibility to medical facilities. For young women under 20, it is also crucial whether they are married or not – girls who marry early have a significantly higher health burden.

In Zimbabwe, medical services for pregnant women are only moderately developed. Good health care systems for pregnant women and women in childbirth are therefore of utmost importance in order to protect women’s lives. In Zimbabwe, UNICEF reports a mortality rate of 581 women per 100,000 live births. [3] By comparison, in Switzerland, 7 women die for every 100,000 births. [4] The Sustainable Development Goals target is a global average of 30 women per 100,000. Given the current crisis in public health (said to be in a coma), Zimbabwe is likely to have taken major steps backwards in recent months. As a country with a very high rate of HIV-infected are in Zimbabwe, at least access to family planning and to HIV testing in Zimbabwe is relatively good. The HIV infection rate in Zimbabwe in 2018 was 12.7% (of 15-49 year olds). [5] Although the figure has decreased, the number remains high. Young women are at particularly high risk of infection: for every young man who becomes infected, there are now 2.5 girls and young women.

Health and gender norms

Patriarchal gender images and perceptions, just like social injustice, also have an impact on female health. In the case of HIV, this is mainly related to the high exposure of young women to older men. Many women engage in occasional sex work and are then at high risk. It is not only that clients refuse condoms. Often it is also the police who harass the women. [6] Around half of regular sex workers carry HIV.

Remedy thanks to norm change…

A comparative study published in the Lancet in December 2019 looked at programmes that combined health interventions with a commitment to tackling gender inequality and which, thanks to comprehensive evaluation, provide important insights for future interventions. [7] According to the authors, approaches are most likely to succeed if they

• involve multiple sectors (i.e. civil society, government and private sector)
• act at different levels and through different actors (e.g. acting in communities and in the broader legislative space).
• combine multi-faceted activities
• involve active participation and even empowerment

The study particularly points to the limitations of programmes that focused almost exclusively on the health and equality of individuals. There is even a certain danger of backlash here, both for the individuals and overall. This is why, according to the study, “societal and structural elements of restrictive gender norms would undermine efforts… and complicate health improvements outside of holistic, systemic approaches.” Or more simply: those who shake up socially entrenched norms will have more success in the long run.

… and active participation of the people

But that’s just it: Norms cannot be prescribed either. So the members of the target groups remain important: they need to be involved, according to the study in the Lancet, because their joint reflection in the group and community is one of the most important prerequisites for success.

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Footnotes and links

[1] «Health for all within a Generation», Manifest of MMS-network (Medicus Mundi Switzerland)

[2] Inequalities in Women’s And Girls’ Health Opportunities And Outcomes: A report from Sub-Saharan Africa

[3] UNICEF, Report

[4] NZZ from 8.10.2006

[5] UNAIDS 2019

[6] https://www.avert.org/professionals/hiv-around-world/sub-saharan-africa/zimbabwe

[7] Characteristics Of Successful Programmes Targeting Gender Inequality And Restrictive Gender Norms For The Health And Wellbeing Of Children, Adolescents, And Young Adults: A Systematic Review

Women and Economy

Women play a huge role in the overall economy of Zimbabwe and at the same time suffer from a number of disadvantages. As a rough conclusion, one has to state: Women work more than men and are exposed to greater risks.

Zimbabwean women see it as their job to feed the family. They get up early in the morning, do the housework and then go to work.

Women who are economically empowered tend to empower others around them, including their children, families and the community at large.

Women in the labour market

Women have careers and are successful. But the resistance is often very great, as reported by Rosewita Katsande of the YETT youth network, who has been monitoring the labour market and women’s careers for many years.

Unemployment and work in the informal sector

Many women with vocational training are unemployed, especially in urban areas. A study of almost 6,000 young Zimbabweans showed that women have only half the chance of employment in the formal sector: only 5.2% of all women work under a proper employment contract. Conversely, significantly more women than men are employed in the informal sector. However, most employers in the informal sector are men, as a study by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) showed. In recent years, women have increasingly been active in male domains, including small-scale mines or quarries.

Although there are also informal social security systems for the informal sector, many women are unable to make regular contributions. Health insurance is also not very accessible for these women and their special needs. Many women have to manage more than one job to have enough income and a stable financial situation. A large number of women therefore work more than 70 hours per week. The YETT study also showed an enormously high proportion of women who regularly or temporarily earn a sideline income from sex work.

Rural women

In the countryside, unemployment rates among young people are lower than in the city. Here, people still live from agriculture. Although women play a crucial role in the agricultural sector, they are highly marginalised. Women in rural areas work 16 to 18 hours a day, according to recent studies. While men contribute only about 45 per cent of the output in the agricultural sector, the percentage of women’s participation has increased to 55 per cent. However, due to cultural norms, women are subordinate to their husbands/partners and so men make household decisions, about land ownership, finances and all valuable livestock in the last instance, often without prior consultation with their wives. The foundation of the rural economy is access to land. This is often denied to women. Widows, for example, regularly go empty-handed in the distribution of their deceased husband’s inherited land. Large investment projects also often have a particularly negative impact on women, as the example in Chisumbanje shows. In the areas where the so-called Fast Track Land Reforms have been carried out, it is also evident overall that women have been disadvantaged.

Land is one of the most striking examples of how women are excluded from access to productive resources. This also applies to the capital market. The financial status of women in Zimbabwe is significantly lower than that of men. The experience in our pilot project area shows that women have virtually no access to commercial credit, mainly because they cannot bring in any collateral in a world where they are effectively excluded from property and inheritance rights. The micro-banking sector that exists in other countries is completely absent in Zimbabwe’s rural areas.

“Poverty becomes more female”

In the agricultural sector in particular, we find many factors that disadvantage women: agricultural production pays women lower wages, commercial farming (and men) push women off the land and put pressure on producers in particular, which is transferred to working and employment conditions. So in many places, women are pushed into a labour market that pays them inadequate and unfair wages. This may also have something to do with the fact that rural economies mobilise women (and children) during labour-intensive periods, while regular tasks tend to be performed by men. “Poverty has a woman’s face,” writes a Zimbabwean woman, or to google it in technical language: “Feminization of Poverty”.

Household work and unpaid work

The fact that women do a lot of unpaid work in the household, raising children or caring for sick or elderly people is a global phenomenon that is criminally neglected by the economic sciences.

Women who live in places where the infrastructure is poor spend much more time on household chores. A study by the English NGO Oxfam calculated that women from the poorest households spend on average 40 minutes more each day collecting firewood and fetching water than economically better-off women. Over the course of an entire woman’s life, this amounts to a full year. Girls from these households have to spend seven hours more per week on household chores. Of course, this also has an impact on education!

It also means that women start working earlier than their male siblings. Even as children, girls are expected to help out in the household. More on this in the chapter Generations.

Especially in countries like Zimbabwe, where HIV is very widespread, the number of those who can take on such tasks at all is also reduced. The International Labour Organisation found that in Zimbabwe, for every 4 people who can care, there are almost 3 people who have to care for them. The HIV epidemic has burdened many older people, and grandmothers in particular, with many additional tasks.

Families who can afford it hire domestic help in Zimbabwe. The government has set a minimum wage for this sector. In the last adjustment in September, a wage of about 170 Zimbabwe dollars was set if domestic workers could live at the place of work for free. At today’s exchange rate, this would be less than 10 USD. Currently, a domestic worker can barely buy two 10-kilo bags of maize with such a wage.

Climate change makes matters worse for many women and girls. Not only does it cause yield and income losses, thus increasing poverty, which in turn adversely affects women’s opportunities. Climate change also greatly increases the workload for water harvesting, for example. And because women are central to both the production and preparation of food, more elaborate but, for example, drought-resistant crops may also mean more work. All in all, the multiple workload can affect the supply of food for women and their families, whereby it is not only a question of the quantity of food, but also of its quality or balance.

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Women’s rights and patriarchal culture

Background

“Women face many challenges. Some of them result directly from traditional ideas of our community and from patriarchal structures. Some of them are exacerbated by these structures.” So says Cynthia Gwenzi, Gender Officer at Platform for Youth Development in Eastern Zimbabwe.

So are societies in Southern Africa patriarchal? The answer is yes, both pre-colonially and as a result of colonial history.

Oppression of women pre-colonial and colonial

African historian Jeff Guy postulated in 1990 that “the best way to understand the oppression of women in pre-colonial societies in southern Africa is to look at the production systems of the time…these societies were based on the appropriation of women’s labour”. Today, such materialist views – while not wrong – have been supplemented by a broader cultural history that restores women to a place as agents of action at all times. The icon for this is Nehanda Charwe Nyakasikana, who was a powerful spiritual leader in the first anti-colonial struggle in Zimbabwe.

History shows that the colonial period massively reinforced the patriarchal system. One example from Zimbabwe was the de facto ban on young women (from the age of 12!) from entering into an arranged marriage. In pre-colonial times, women still had the possibility to run away with a lover over all mountains and thus come to a love marriage, which was subsequently regularised by the families. The colonial marriage law, however, stipulated that marriage and cohabitation “always” required the consent of the pater familias.

The history of colonial jurisprudence and administration, and also of the Christian mission, shows that the patriarchal ideas of colonial masters and missionaries repeatedly led to an alliance with particularly patriarchal interests of Africans. There is no doubt that many mission stations were a haven for young women seeking liberation from confining conditions. However, this liberation usually came at the price of subordination to the paternalism of the mission leaders.

Racist and patriarchal interpretations of “traditions”

The Zimbabwean social scientist Rekopantswe Mate recently wrote for the journal afrika süd about customary law as a racist and male-biased version of culture and tradition. According to Mate, this customary law is stable because religion, the education system and also the idea of “development” make it difficult for women even today to have an emancipated view of history.

Thus, customary law and moral condemnations often go hand in hand. To this day, women who escape male control are denied honourability and are often called “prostitutes”. Even moving to the city undermined a woman’s respectability. Women in the city therefore developed new codes of honourability – although it remains important to maintain contact with the family in the countryside. This example in particular shows well how new forms of patriarchal oppression emerged during the colonial period, as well as new forms of gender identities as lived by women.

Cultural debate under the sign of an anti-feminist backlash

Those who invoke culture still use one of the most significant weapons in the debates around women’s rights. NGOs representing women’s rights are portrayed by many, not least the ruling party, as a kind of Trojan horse with which the West is trying to maintain neo-imperialist control over Zimbabwe.

Feminists and their organisations, on the other hand, stress that women’s rights are indeed a Zimbabwean issue and also emphasise the role of these rights in Zimbabwean cultures. For example, they describe child marriages as a “harmful cultural practice”: not because they are necessarily rooted in local cultures, but rather because the patriarchal twisting of culture leads to excesses and then legitimises them as “traditions”.

An example of this was the introduction of laws against domestic violence in 2006. In the end, the women’s minister and civil society organisations prevailed. However, the debate was heated and loud, precisely because opposition politicians also joined the camp of the rejecting men’s guild. They said that women were not equal to men and that this “diabolical” law undermined the traditional status of men. For the state to interfere in the private affairs of men, they said, was against culture and tradition. Obedience in marriage and modest dress were promoted as traditional mechanisms against gender-based violence.

A missed departure?

The fact that such colonially overlaid currents of argumentation can persist to this day is actually astonishing. For in the 1970s, young women were invited to take on new roles as liberation fighters in the anti-colonial war. Many did – and many were disappointed. If this phase can be called a first phase of feminism in Zimbabwe, one must speak overall of a patriarchal backlash in the name of traditionalism and nationalism.

Women make history

Is there a way out of this backlash that could do without a critical examination of history? How else do women* defend themselves against those who invoke supposedly unshakeable traditions and defend patriarchal culture as “genuinely African”? With what awareness could the argument be refuted that the commitment to “fairness and equality … is anti-cultural, un-African and thus subversive”?

Rekonpatswe Mate points out that above all, the changeability of pre-colonial practices must be brought back into focus. That cultures and traditions should bring solutions to communities and not exist for there to be something that is absolute and unchanging. And she stresses that the lack of reflection on the influence of colonial rule weighs heavily. That is why a direct recourse to pre-colonial models that are supposedly vouched for today is not useful. Overall, Rekonpantswe Mate seems to have little hope that the conditions and a good space exist today for such a historical debate.

Broader alliances for a progressive culture

The fepa partner organisation Platform for Youth and Community Development, of which Cynthia Gwenzi is a member, takes a somewhat more positive view. Hope could come from the fact that the debate on women’s rights and culture is breaking through the usual binary political system in Zimbabwe. What started in 2006 with the debate on domestic violence is still evident today: politicians from all camps are publicly campaigning against gender-based violence. This opens up possibilities for civil society engagement and alliances among women, where discussions about progressive and emancipatory elements in traditions become possible. For Cynthia Gwenzi, this is one of the levers to fight for a progressive culture.

If you want to know more about the conditions for feminism and activism for women’s rights, visit our information page on Afrofeminism or follow us on Facebook for regular updates. Don’t forget to share the events and like fepa!

Appendix: Aspects of historical gender relations in Zimbabwe, based on Mate et al.

Pre-colonial gender relations

• Zimbabwe is ethnically and culturally diverse. Cultural identities have always been fluid: women in particular acquired multiple identities through marriage and moving.
• Patrilineality: for most ethnic groups, group membership, and thus access to resources or inheritance, runs in the patriline.
• Patriarchal: pre-colonial societies in Zimbabwe were male dominated.
• Women had a lower status. Extended families disposed of them as gifts to powerful people, as debt pawns or as surrogate wives. Women born into privileged circumstances tended to remain protected.
• Marriage “was a kinship-motivated and male-dominated social, economic and political alliance between or within kin groups”. In other words, marriage was not a pure love match, but was meant to serve families and communities.
• The “bride price” was an expression of these reciprocal relationships: Families exchanged valuable productive items with the wife’s parental family.
• Wives were given access to land and could earn their own income on it to feed the family. In Shona culture, they could also bequeath the income they had earned themselves.

Christianisation and colonialism

• Economically, women benefited from new opportunities until about 1930. Then, when the colonial economy needed more male labour, the workload for women increased sharply.
• At the same time, a colonial legal system was established that severely limited women’s opportunities. Men were given new ways to control women if that helped maintain control over men. In the context of a dual legal system, a patriarchal “indigenous” customary law solidified, claiming moral supremacy to this day.
• Christian communities offered new role models and femininities, characterised by “domesticity”. They propagated male-dominated forms of agriculture.
• Many women’s activities were lost: in pre-colonial times, women were still more common as craftswomen, as healers or midwives, or they also went hunting with men. Many of these areas were re-regulated to the detriment of African women.
• The “bride price” came in for sweeping criticism as a monetisation of marriage. In practice, however, it is still the prerequisite for a marriage that is considered respectable.