Women should change their narrative

By Angeline Zimbwani Mikiri. Women are born with different shades which are meant to function in various facets of life. I have come to realize that there is no limitation in the make of a woman. You cannot say one function of a woman and conclude. Phenomenal men and women have been raised by some brave women who even up to now they feel inferior or think lowly of themselves. Yet they have done remarkable things in the world. I have always given an example of my late mother who ran a home in the absence of my father who was working in the City. My late mother was a commercial farmer in a communal set up. She would harvest tons and tons of maize and sell to the Grain Marketing Board. I remember the other time when she bought a plough, a scotch cart and a cultivator. She then called my uncle Enock Rwodzi to come and write a family name on our green scotch cart with a red paint and he wrote ‘ Mr James Kembo Zimbwani and his Son”. Though she had worked hard to buy all these, she still felt in her heart that these household possessions belonged to my father and my brother. Although we were 5 girls and 1 boy in our family my mother decided to include my brother excluding girls and herself. The society has crafted the system to make men as the sole custodians of family possessions. The thought of her as the co-owner of the property never rang in her mind. In her mind she thought property is partriachial. In my opinion she could have just included her name on the cart but she thought it was not proper for her to be included. Things are what they are because of the cultural system which had been set. Years later I began to reminisce and I saw everything wrong about the whole scenario. Certainly it was not my father’s fault and to tell the truth my father was not even there when the cart was being branded. It was not my mother’s fault either. I feel no one is to blame in the whole situation but it is the way things and how the system was crafted. But what has prompted me to write this article is the way women feel they have been left behind in as far as empowerment is concerned. Even though my mother had worked so hard, in the present set up we cannot call her a bankable woman. She cannot acquire any loan from the bank or any mortgage because she has nothing to her name. Bob Marley once sang this song” Emancipate yourself from mental slavery. None but our selved can free our minds. Changing the narrative is the way to go in the 21st century. Calling the shorts requires those in the game not the cheerleaders. Thinking about the family is not bad but a woman should consider thinking about herself as well. They call it a ‘me ‘time when one can say I need to acquire my things first this time, for and by me. The entire outcry that is there now, is the result of the decisions we made in the past. Thank God even the Government is correcting some of the errors. For the sake of the future generation let us begin to talk about how a woman can acquire wealth in her name for the benefit of the whole clan. Women empowerment process should start in the mind. The discussion must begin to sink in each and every girl child not when she has things but when she is preparing for her journey of life. When a young woman owns her chicken or a goat, she must be taught that she can own a plot full of goats and chicken and still exist as a woman without any apology. It should be something very normal and a curriculum that should be extended in school. The Status quo of saying bring your husband should be a thing of the past in the 21st century. A woman must be in a position to walk in any financial institution and complete her transactions without so many questions asked of where her husband is or her male guardian. A woman should feel complete to acquire any asset in her name without so many questions asked as long as she is working hard for such. More information should go to girls in communities that they can be empowered and create their own wealth. In as much as girls are taught how to look after their husbands and run their matrimonial homes properly, they should be taught how to acquire wealth and empowerment at a very tender age.They need to be taught that it’s not a crime to create wealth but a form of building a nation.