What’s a queen without her king? Well, historically speaking, more powerful. A single woman from Kenya has proved it for sure. She is a woman of the “Samburu” tribe of Kenya, where woman are treated as “commodity”. She had primary school education & later joined the Catholic nursing training center but dropped out before 6months of completion due to lack of fees . She was married off at an age of 18 and her dowry consisted of 17 cows & she was subjected to domestic violence & suffered from a sense of lack of self dignity, this prompted her to start her own business of & stand up for rights of other women in the village. When goons mercilessly bit her & taking advantage of the absence of her husband’s absence & her husband, after returning home decided not to pay heed to the beatings , she decided to leave him . So she decided to leave her husband & with help of few other betrayed tortured women of the village, she founded a new village ruled by women & this is the village “Umoja”. This woman we are talking about is none other than the 2010 Global Leadership Award recipient Rebecca Lolosoli.
Women in Samburu tribe are considered as properties of their husbands. They are not allowed to own land or any other property & traditionally have subordinate position in their society. These women are subjected to female genital mutilation & other sexist social norm. They are forced to marry elders. Domestic violence & rape are extremely common among the tribe’s men. In a rather barbaric episode of sexual violence 1400 samburu girls were raped by army officers & surprisingly no actions were taken against any one of them. Some of these assaulted women were abandoned by their husbands as they had lost their so-called ‘purity’ & other men drove their wives out of their houses fearing that they might get STD from them. This played a pivotal role in the conceptualization of Umoja. Lolosoli was the one, who came up with the idea of creating a village only for women when she was recovering after being beaten for speaking out. Eventually 15other women came together & found the original village in 1990. That’s how Umoja was founded.
Umoja in Swahili means unity. This 1st matriarchal village founded in 1990 founded by Rebecca Lolosoli is situated 380km away from Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. A plethora of sexual assault survivors, domestic violence survivors & other women who feel entrapped in patriarchal shackles, call Umoja their home. These women are aware of their rights & they run a primary school to educate the children of the village & children from other villages are allowed too. These women run a cultural center & camping sites for tourists visiting the nearby “Samburu National reserve” & they also create & sell traditional jewellery to the tourists. The village is made up of “manyata”huts built from a mixture of earth & cow dung on abandoned grassland.
The residents of Umoja have an objective to “Improve the livelihoods of women suffering from rampant poverty & counter the problem of women being abandoned by their families”. The village also gives shelter to runaways or girls who were thrown out of their households & raises orphans, abandoned children & children having HIV. The village also provides asylum for women fleeing violence from the Turkana District. Female genital mutilation is outlawed in the village. Men are allowed to visit the village & women of Umoja are allowed to have boyfriends or husbands of their choice. As of 2015, there were 47 women & 200 children living in the village. For making decisions for the village, the women of the village gather under the “Tree of Speech” & Lolosoli serves as the chair person of the village. All women in the village have equal status to one another. The women in Umoja live together in absolute peace & harmony away from the world of toxic patriarchy.
However, the creation of the village wasn’t any smooth process. The samburu men challenged the women with many hurdles. In 1990, in response to the newly founded Umoja, some men established their own villages nearby but that were eventually unsuccessful. The men also tried to set up a rival craft business & mislead tourists to step in to Umoja. The women started selling vegetables which were bought from others but it wasn’t a successful venture so the women started making traditional crafts & selling them to Tourists. After Lolosoli visited the United Nations in 2005, men of neighboring villages filed a court case against her, hoping to shut down the village, and in 2009 Lolosoli’s former husband attacked the village in an attempt to threaten her. In spite of facing these problems the women are standing for themselves & their rights. Now the women of the village own the village’s land. The struggle of these women has etched an indelible mark in international feminist history & many women have been inspired by Umoja. In Syria a woman only village named “Jinwar” has been established in the year 2018 inspired by the brave heart of samburu.
Inspired by the women who refused to submit to the whims of patriarchy, Inspired by the woman who was beaten up, disowned by her own husband & mercilessly threatened ….…… yet she stood up & inspired thousand of girls to do so with her assistance. Rebecca Lolosoli stand as the flag bearer of feminism in its truest essence & what it is capable of achieving.
So what's your opinion about Rebecca Lolosoli & Umoja?was it a great step that shouldbe taken by all the tortured women?or is there any other solution against the extreme violence against women?let us know by providing your opinions in the comment section.
By- Primavera
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umoja,_Kenya
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebecca_Lolosoli
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samburu_County
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/aug/16/village-where-men-are-banned-womens-rights-kenya
Women in Samburu tribe are considered as properties of their husbands. They are not allowed to own land or any other property & traditionally have subordinate position in their society. These women are subjected to female genital mutilation & other sexist social norm. They are forced to marry elders. Domestic violence & rape are extremely common among the tribe’s men. In a rather barbaric episode of sexual violence 1400 samburu girls were raped by army officers & surprisingly no actions were taken against any one of them. Some of these assaulted women were abandoned by their husbands as they had lost their so-called ‘purity’ & other men drove their wives out of their houses fearing that they might get STD from them. This played a pivotal role in the conceptualization of Umoja. Lolosoli was the one, who came up with the idea of creating a village only for women when she was recovering after being beaten for speaking out. Eventually 15other women came together & found the original village in 1990. That’s how Umoja was founded.
Umoja in Swahili means unity. This 1st matriarchal village founded in 1990 founded by Rebecca Lolosoli is situated 380km away from Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. A plethora of sexual assault survivors, domestic violence survivors & other women who feel entrapped in patriarchal shackles, call Umoja their home. These women are aware of their rights & they run a primary school to educate the children of the village & children from other villages are allowed too. These women run a cultural center & camping sites for tourists visiting the nearby “Samburu National reserve” & they also create & sell traditional jewellery to the tourists. The village is made up of “manyata”huts built from a mixture of earth & cow dung on abandoned grassland.
The residents of Umoja have an objective to “Improve the livelihoods of women suffering from rampant poverty & counter the problem of women being abandoned by their families”. The village also gives shelter to runaways or girls who were thrown out of their households & raises orphans, abandoned children & children having HIV. The village also provides asylum for women fleeing violence from the Turkana District. Female genital mutilation is outlawed in the village. Men are allowed to visit the village & women of Umoja are allowed to have boyfriends or husbands of their choice. As of 2015, there were 47 women & 200 children living in the village. For making decisions for the village, the women of the village gather under the “Tree of Speech” & Lolosoli serves as the chair person of the village. All women in the village have equal status to one another. The women in Umoja live together in absolute peace & harmony away from the world of toxic patriarchy.
However, the creation of the village wasn’t any smooth process. The samburu men challenged the women with many hurdles. In 1990, in response to the newly founded Umoja, some men established their own villages nearby but that were eventually unsuccessful. The men also tried to set up a rival craft business & mislead tourists to step in to Umoja. The women started selling vegetables which were bought from others but it wasn’t a successful venture so the women started making traditional crafts & selling them to Tourists. After Lolosoli visited the United Nations in 2005, men of neighboring villages filed a court case against her, hoping to shut down the village, and in 2009 Lolosoli’s former husband attacked the village in an attempt to threaten her. In spite of facing these problems the women are standing for themselves & their rights. Now the women of the village own the village’s land. The struggle of these women has etched an indelible mark in international feminist history & many women have been inspired by Umoja. In Syria a woman only village named “Jinwar” has been established in the year 2018 inspired by the brave heart of samburu.
Inspired by the women who refused to submit to the whims of patriarchy, Inspired by the woman who was beaten up, disowned by her own husband & mercilessly threatened ….…… yet she stood up & inspired thousand of girls to do so with her assistance. Rebecca Lolosoli stand as the flag bearer of feminism in its truest essence & what it is capable of achieving.
By- Primavera
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umoja,_Kenya
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebecca_Lolosoli
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samburu_County
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/aug/16/village-where-men-are-banned-womens-rights-kenya
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