Kabaji, Egara. 1997. Women in Development Eldoret, Kenya: Zapf Chancery. pp. 36, US$6.
In the Eastern African region, women are gaining access to areas long viewed as a male preserve, such as political leadership. While Uganda has had a female VicePresident, Dr. Specioza. Kazibwe, for years, Tanzania and Kenya have had female cabinet ministers. Perhaps it goes without saying that there are also female university professors and vice-chancellors in the region.
In this book, Egara Kabaji analyses the role of women in present-day Kenya. The book is divided into five chapters. Starting with their role in maintaining the family unit, the book takes a general look at the contributions women have made in Kenyan society over the years. The first chapter is entitled "Maintenance of Family Units". This chapter underscores the importance of the family as the starting point of the process of socializing children into responsible citizens.
In the face of the demands of modern society, women in Kenya must bear the pivotal responsibility of heading most rural households when their husbands have migrated to the towns in search of employment. Thus, they are often neglected by their husbands, many of whom end up marrying other wives in the city. The women not only bear the children but also feed and educate the young. Given that 85% of Kenya's population is rural, this chapter correctly concludes that women also determine the moral fabric of Kenyan society as they are charged with transmitting folk wisdom to their offspring.
Despite their crucial social roles, Kenyan women still lag behind in terms of opportunity vis-a-vis their male compatriots. The woman is often a victim of discrimination both at home and in the office. Customs and traditions have given women far less access to education. Early marriages of girls are common in Kenya and girls are still seen as a source of bride-wealth for their parents. This chapter makes a strong case for the domestic role of Kenyan women.
Chapter Two is entitled "Women in Agricultural Production". Here, the author ably analyses the economic contribution of women to Kenyan society whose mainstay is agriculture. The author correctly stresses the dominant position of the agricultural sector in Kenya's economy. Agriculture accounts for 60% of the value of all of Kenya's exports and 70% of the national labour force. He goes on to note that "women are responsible for 60-80% of food production in the rural areas of Africa, but interestingly, they reap little from their labour". Another irony that the author records is that many people in Africa consider women as weak and men as the true bread-winners in most rural homes but research indicates that women form the bulk of real producers in the rural economies. They work longer hours per day than men and their burden gets heavier as the population increases. Worse still, natural hazards such as drought, a familiar experience in rural Africa,'add to the woes of the woman's lot.
Citing research by Hermann Baumann in 140 African countries, Kabaji explains that women in Africa face social constraints which have existed since colonial times. They have continued to perform over 60% of farming-related duties; yet, in many cases, they are still repressed by cultural and religious inhibitions which define them as dependents. He argues that when artificial constraints bar women from getting investment capital and property rights, the whole society pays the price, since agricultural productivity will not be optimal. Women's representation at both decision-making and marketing levels, as well as boosting their education and intellectual awareness, are two ways of improving women's welfare. This chapter concludes that the empowerment of women to manage their earnings and their full integration in development are key to the pursuit of sustainable development in Kenya and in Africa as a whole.
The third chapter has the title "Women Groups and Development". It picks up where the previous chapter stops and examines efforts made by women to help themselves while contributing to national development. Faced with myriad problems, e.g., fetching water miles away from home and transporting vegetables from the farms to the market centres for sale, rural women' have come up with a form of collectivism for mutual assistance which has greatly alleviated their poverty and, by extension, improved their family lives.
This chapter is fully based on the Kenyan situation. The author cites the matega among the Kikuyu and the masanga among the Luhya ethnic communities. Such communities, says the writer, are on the rise in Kenya. In 1994, there were 23,614 groups. 80% of the groups came up in the 1980s, 4 % in the 1960s and 1% in the 1950s. Praising the role this unity has played in improving women's social and economic conditions, Kabaji notes that "women groups form a formidable force in the politics of many countries." Their strength is evidenced by the fact that "there were many women who sought election for parliamentary and civic seats and won" during Kenya's national elections in 1992. That "all male candidates had to appeal to female votes to secure victory" is also a sign of this strength, he adds. The author, however, should perhaps have stated that 60% of all voters in Kenya are women who also form 52.4% of the country's population.
Towards the end of the chapter, the author enumerates some of the obstacles to women's advancement in Kenya: lack of business capital, which he says can be solved by financial institutions such as banks; lack of technical know-how such as managerial skills, whose antidote, according to the author, is short-term training in the form of seminars, `workshops and agricultural extension services; difficulties in marketing their produce due to poor co-ordination and planning by the government; poor infrastructure in terms of roads and communication facilities, the proposed remedy here being increased government participation in the marketing of women's produce and government efforts to improve transport conditions in Kenya.
The sixth obstacle is information blackout in which women, especially rural ones, have very limited access to sources of information - for instance, where to get assistance when in need. Suggested solution: mass-education of women-group leaders who in turn will enlighten their members. Political interference by male political leaders is the seventh.problem experienced by women groups. This has often caused misappropriation of funds and tampering with the running of the groups. The author suggests that the government should make it a policy not to meddle in women's affairs.
Noting that despite their marginalisation in traditional Africa, women have emerged as exceptional achievers in all domains of life. Kabaji lists some Kenyan women who have attained top positions in the fields of politics, science and education. He observes that Uganda has a woman vice-president and concludes that efforts towards poverty alleviation and sustainable development cannot be fruitful without the full participation of women.
Chapter Four is on "Women in Liberation Struggles". Here, the author takes a pan-African view of women's contribution to the political liberation of the continent. He decries the false impression in Africa than women never participate in national liberation struggles. This situation, says Kabaji, is partly due to the fact that many war records do not document the role women played.
Examples from South Africa and the dreaded Amazon Women fighters of Dahomey (now Benin), Queen Amina of Zaria in Nigeria, Teurai Ropy., the Zimbabwean freedom fighter, as well as numerous Kenyan examples bear out women's participation in Africa's history. One Kenyan woman freedom fighter was Mary Nyanjiru. She stands out in Kenya because she was shot dead by British colonialists who thought her dangerous. Her role in Kenya's independence struggle was prominent. But, laments Kabaji, "the story of this great daughter of Kenya is undocumented; not even a street has been named in her honour".
1n Chapter Five, "Obstacles to Women's Participation: A Gender Sensitive Approach," the author comes back to Kenya and identifies a number of factors which continue to perpetuate the secondary position of women.in society. The first is poor educational standards. Women have been less successfitI in Kenya's education system because of high dropout rates at various levels. The dropout is due to teenage pregnancies, early marriage and low enrolment of girls in school by parents who view daughters as naturally destined for domestic chores. The author notes, however, that the national participation rate of girls in primary education stood at 48% in 1997. This dips at higher levels of education to only 25% at university. At this point the author provides the 1987 data on girls' (as a percentage of total) enrolment in primary schools in Kenya. Among 41 districts, the highest figure is 50% and the lowest is 24%. The data shows that Central and Rift Valley Provinces have the best girl enrollment rates and North-Eastern Province the worst.
It is at this stage, as the author decries the high wastage (dropout) rates, that he muddles up his figures. Within a paragraph he writes: "Incidentally, statistics show that 63.2% of the 1974 Standard One intakes did not reach Standard 8. In 1979, 64.7% of the Standard 7 intakes did not make it to Standard 8 in 1986". The dates are mixed up because the pupils who enrolled in Standard One in 1974 were in the 7.4.2.3 system of education which went up to Standard 7 for the primary school cycle. This system ended in 1983 when the last Certificate of Primary Education (CPE) examination was taken at Class 7. On the other hand, the pupils who entered Standard One in 1979 were in the new 8.4.4 education system that is still in place today. They were to sit for the modified Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) examination in 1986.
The other major obstacle to women's progress cited by the author is negative social attitudes towards girls and women in Kenyan society. These attitudes have ,entrenched themselves form colonial times and deny women public roles. The prevalent myth is that men alone should be leaders and women should stay in the kitchen. This has for long created lack of self-confidence in African women and nurtured male chauvinism. Men at times exploit this state of affairs to denigrate ambitious women. Kabaji says that "women's reluctance to stand for election in many African countries should be seen in the above light. It is, for instance, common knowledge ~ that there are more women voters in Kenya (than men) but very few women stand for election." The point here is valid, albeit in contrast to the point made earlier in Chapter 3 where the author asserted that "in the 1992 elections (in Kenya), there were many women who sought election for parliamentary and civic seats and indeed won."
This book would fit very well an undergraduate class of culture and gender studies. Also, due to its simple structure and vocabulary, it may also be used, inter adia, by a non-academic audience such as women's groups, non-governmental organizations or community development officers.
And herein lies the uniqueness of the book, that its simple, straightforward language and structure mean it can have a wide appeal. The book's down-to-earth style makes it accessible to both an academic and a general readership. I would add that this book is unique in that it is written by a man while it tackles women's issues. It is not common, in Kenya at least, to find such an authoritative test on women done by a man.
Ogutu, James N.
Moi University
Eldoret, Kenya