Hope in a ravaged continent

In an Africa beset by wars and Aids, Brenda Gourley explains how to help African girls get an education.

Even a month ago I would never have imagined that I would become a proponent of a women's university. What changed my mind?

Last month I attended the general assembly of the Forum for African Women in Education in Nairobi. This group of women are all either ministers of education in their country or vice-chancellors of universities or senior policy-makers in Africa. Needless to say, it is a small group (about 60), but very committed.

Not often do you find such a group willing to make time in their schedules to discuss ways of increasing the numbers of girls in schools and higher education. The statistics are frightening. Millions of girls are not in school and never will be. Customs and traditions mean most African countries do not consider women as important as men and so do not habitually send their girls to school.

The forum's role is to change that by advocacy, by education, by influence, by every means possible. It is a long haul.

This year the organisers decided to bring one child from each country represented in the forum to Nairobi to tell their story and, indeed, to challenge us. What amazing stories we heard.

We know of wars in Africa, massacres in Rwanda and Burundi, refugee camps of Sudan, the ravages of Aids and the grinding poverty that is a direct result. It is quite another thing for the victims to stand before you and tell, in chilling and explicit detail, the daily realities of their lives. One girl, probably 13 or 14 years old, recounted how she lived in a refugee camp, how she had seen her mother killed in the war, how her father had disappeared long ago during the war and how she had sole responsibility for her two siblings. A tall, attractive and dignified girl, she spoke plainly and simply. She had more to tell us, but stopped, looked into the distance and tears just rolled down her cheeks. I weep again as I write. The whole audience wept.

Each story is as chilling. Millions of children in Rwanda who had seen atrocities befall their parents that no adults, much less children, should ever witness. Orphans, all of them. No one to care for them. Across the continent it is common for girls to be the head of a household. Orphaned by war or by Aids, alone and abandoned, by you and me as well as their own.

Tales from countries not at war were almost as bad. Young girls sold into prostitution to increase the desperately small household incomes, raped by family members and even school teachers. Abandoned to their own resources if they become pregnant, they are further away from achieving their potential than they ever were, as even the schools refuse to allow pregnant pupils to continue their studies.

Every day in Africa about 6,000 girls are circumcised, a practice sanctioned by "customary law" and usually undertaken by women. How depressing that we women cannot even conspire among ourselves to disobey these man-made laws.

I was forced to reflect how narrow a margin of time separated me from an age and class where women were regarded as inferior, the withholding of the vote being just one example of this discrimination. Swiss women have only had the vote for a few decades. It seems to me that the countries from which I heard these very personal stories could, in fact, be countries from nearly every continent. War exaggerates poverty as well as the effects of poverty and discrimination. The powers that be make far greater efforts to halt war in some parts of the world (Kosovo is an obvious example compared with Rwanda or Burundi). Aids is ravaging Africa, but it is a growing problem in other parts of the world and that exaggerates the horror and consequences for millions of individuals.

What kind of society are we that turns a blind eye to our fellow human beings? What kind of society are we that chooses to ignore the plight of millions and millions of children - so many orphaned by no fault of their own, and perhaps (albeit indirectly) through some fault of ours?

If this account moves you at all, perhaps it will move you to support the forum and the remarkable women who implement its objectives. We can all help with "building public awareness", one of the forum's goals. "Designing interventions" is another and there is much to be researched both in the design and evaluation phases. This too gives scope for the international research community to play its part. "Creating and sustaining partnerships with governments, donors, NGOs and other stakeholders in education to increase their investment in girls' education" is an objective that lends itself to garnering support and influence wherever each of us may be able to exercise our influence. The forum also runs a scholarship fund to support outstanding girls in their schooling and tertiary education - and everyone can help here.

I reflected, too, on South Africa. Not only is ten years of compulsory schooling for all built into our laws, but we have one of the highest number of women parliamentarians in the world as well as one of the highest (if not the highest) number of women in our cabinet. Many universities have an equal number of male and female students; three (out of 21) have women vice-chancellors. I wish that I could say that our academic body was gender-balanced, but it is not and I have yet to hear of a university where it is - anywhere. While we extend a helping hand to those less fortunate than ourselves elsewhere in the world, can we also start getting our own act together?

Brenda Gourley is vice-chancellor of the University of Natal, Durban. FAWE's address is PO Box 53168, Nairobi, Kenya.