Somaliland Women Take on New Roles

May 3, 2005 - (IRIN) The old Somali adage, "A mother's purpose is to be a cook, laundrywoman, nurturer and wife to her husband," describes to some degree the traditional role of the women in Somaliland.

That role was radically altered by the Somali civil war of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Traditionally, Somali men were the providers of their families' basic needs. However, when the civil war erupted, thousands of them were killed, maimed or exiled.

"More than 20,000 men lost their lives during the civil war, leaving widows and orphans behind," Hussein Ahmed, of Somaliland's War Crimes Investigation Commission, told IRIN in Hargeysa, the capital of the self-declared Republic of Somaliland.

"Over 300,000 people were displaced externally and internally due to the war, many of them men who have permanently settled elsewhere and married other wives," Hussein added.

Of the dead, up to 3,500 people in Somaliland were killed by landmines alone, according to the medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières. Another estimated 1,500 had their limbs amputated, rendering the men among them unable to work to support their families.

In the aftermath of the war, the task of caring for the thousands of families in Somaliland fell to the women, who had to take on the dual role of father and mother in their homes.

According to a 2004 World Bank survey, women were the breadwinners in 70 percent of Somaliland households.

SOCIAL FACTORS

Apart from death and displacement, there was another significant reason that forced women to become the breadwinners in their homes: Most men in Somaliland consume khat, which can become addictive and stop users from being productive.

Khat is a plant found across East Africa whose leaves or buds are either chewed or brewed as a drink, primarily as a stimulant.

The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) describes the short-term effects of using khat as mental alertness and excitement. Once the euphoria has worn off, UNODC says, users become morose, irritable and slack. Prolonged use leads to depression, aggressive behaviour and
psychological dependence.

A look around the busy market in Hargeysa reveals that women run many of the stalls. They must work or their families would go without even the most basic needs.

"I started trading in the market in 1995 when my husband got hooked to chewing khat," Asha Mohammed, a vendor in the market told IRIN. "He lost his job because of chewing khat."

Her husband later deserted the family, leaving her to care for their six children, she added.

Mohammed's story is not uncommon in Somaliland, as the use of the stimulant is very much a part of the social fabric and is therefore widely accepted.

It is so well established in Somali culture that when the price of khat doubled in 2003, hundreds of people who chew khat marched in protest in Hargeysa.

"Most men in Somaliland have forsaken their families and gotten hooked on khat," Shukri Harir Ismail, of the project, Health Unlimited - Well Woman Media, told IRIN.

"These men could have made a big difference to the country's living standards with all the money they spend on khat," she said.

Somalia's civil war also led to rampant unemployment in Somaliland, which has one of the world's poorest economies.

According to the UN, more than 73 percent of the population lives in poverty, while 43 percent live in extreme poverty. The use of Khat has increased in part due to the rise in unemployment.

Polygamy has also contributed to the increasing number of female breadwinners in Somaliland. Somalis follow Islamic tradition, which allows men to marry up to four wives provided they are able to support them.

However, Somaliland's men are so poor that they can barely afford to support one wife. When a man marries several women, his wives are forced to take up an economic activity to sustain their families.

Fozia Elmi had to begin selling fresh milk when her husband married a second wife. "He was jobless for a long time, but still married another woman, knowing that he was already unable to provide for me and our children," she told IRIN.

While women's responsibilities in Somaliland society have drastically increased recently, the change has not been translated to an improvement in their status in society.

Women remain at the bottom rung of the social ladder in Somaliland. They continue to be subjected to serious injustices like female genital mutilation: A 2004 study by the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) found that Somaliland has a 98 percent prevalence rate.

Illiteracy is also widespread in Somaliland, particularly among women. According to UNICEF, the country had only a 22 percent primary school enrolment in 2004, nine percent of which were girls. That figure dropped to six percent for secondary school.

Relief workers in Hargeysa said violent crimes against women were also common in Somaliland.

"Cases of domestic violence and rape are on the increase," Ayanle Jama, a human rights officer with NAGAAD, an umbrella organisation for women in Somaliland, told IRIN.

She also said divorce was on the rise, adding that women rarely received a fair hearing in a judicial system whose laws favour men. Husbands are able to divorce their wives easily in Somaliland, leaving many women to sustain their families single-handedly.

Even in the marketplace, where the women sit for hours each day trying to eke out a living, conditions aren't easy.

"We [women] cannot use the public toilets in the [Hargeysa] market," Fatima Ibrahim, a khat trader, told IRIN.

Women often arrive at the market as early as four o'clock in the morning and have to stay there until late in the evening. However, because women and men are discouraged from mixing in public areas, women are forced to spend all day without visiting the shared toilets.

"I was recently diagnosed with a kidney complication, which was probably caused by the situation I find myself in," Ibrahim added.

PROMOTING WOMEN

Aid agencies are trying to provide some relief to women. UNICEF has started education projects to promote the education of girls, and the relief organisation, CARE International, is setting up micro-credit schemes to enable women to start up small businesses.

In 2002, the UN Development Fund for Women, UNIFEM, carried out a gender-justice project. "As a result of the gender awareness created and the advocacy initiatives generated towards the inclusion of women into law enforcement agencies, 30 women police officers were recruited by the Somaliland police," it said.

Local NGOs such as NAGAAD are also involved in trying to advance the economic, social and political status of women in Somaliland.

Recently, the Somaliland government appointed two women to its cabinet, a first for the republic. However, for the women in Hargeysa market, much more needs to be done to redress the imbalance in their society.

"Appointing two women to cabinet should not be considered a development yardstick - our problems must be addressed," one trader told IRIN.

Somaliland is located to the northwest of Somalia, in the Horn of Africa. It declared its independence from Somalia in 1991, but to date has not gained recognition as a legitimate state.