To achieve MDGs, educate women

By Kwamboka Oyaro

As the heads of states' meeting on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in New York got underway, I thought of a family I recently visited in Majengo slums, about 2km to the east of Nairobi city centre, that struggles to feed its five members the same way another family I had seen about ten years earlier in the same slums did.

One thing stood out: The mothers/wives in the two poor families are uneducated. And, in my opinion, the sorry state of their being stems from lack of education.

Ten years ago, the government set up an ambitious plan with a powerful team mandated to eradicate poverty in line with the MDGs. The poverty eradication team took us (journalists) to Majengo to spell out their strategy on moving people from living ‘on less than a dollar a day’ to a level they would afford to have ‘three meals a day’.

The slum dwellers danced and, with fanfare, the journey towards a good life had begun. To them and most of us at the venue, hope was in the air and by 2015, we would have a country with happy people.

The concerns of the Majengo (and other poor settlements’) people — especially women — we talked to then, still remain the same ten years later. The bottom line for the women was poor or lack of education, which contributed to the many challenges they had. A mother of four young children said something I have never forgotten, “If only I could ‘swallow’ these children, I would gladly do so. Get an education and only worry about myself.”

Her statement encompassed many issues that need to be tackled for the country to fulfill almost all of its MDGs promises.

If this woman had an education, she would have known the use of contraceptives and hence had avoided pregnancy in the first place. Indeed, the recent Kenya population census shows a huge number of people are illiterate and only less than a million (out of the nearly 40 million people) have a university education. The most affected are, of course, women.

Yet, according to Sha Zukang, under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, education is vital in achieving the MDGs. It goes hand in hand with use of contraceptives. Women with a secondary education use contraceptives four times more than among those with no education.

In addition, educated women give their children quality life as they know all about balanced diet, saving and investing. With this power, women, in their small and big ways, are the true pillars of development, hence women are the real focus for the success of MDGs.

So, to break the poverty cycle and set people on the development path, educating a woman is vital. Perhaps it is this reality that saw the Kenyan government introduce universal free primary education in 2003.

Though it encouraged more girls to go to school, poverty is pushing many more from school - early marriage in some cultures and child prostitution especially in the tourism sector are derailing the efforts of liberating women and setting them up for success.

Sometimes, I wonder whether the government is committed to achieving the MDGs especially when it comes to the protection of the girl. Why do perpetrators of early marriage, teachers who impregnate their students and others involved in derailing the girl’s education punished lightly? And some parents are still left scot-free when they choose to educate their son at the expense of their daughters!

Yet many parents of daughters talk proudly of their children. An elderly man recently talked glowingly on radio about his two educated daughters.

“If I had a choice now, I’d ask God to give me only daughters,” he said. When he was asked what he had against his sons he said, “They are selfish. If my daughters heard that I am unwell right now, they will stop what they are doing and do everything possible to ensure I am comfortable.”

As they say, when you educate a woman, you educate a community while educating a man is just investing in an individual.

It is my hope that the heads of states will come up with a strategy to ensure all girls get an education and whoever stands on their way is heavily punished. That means all the girls I see selling groundnuts to motorists on the highway will be sent to school and whoever engages them in child labour is punished.

The government’s plan to aggressively campaign for family planning to check the population explosion expected will not bear fruit unless the women in Majengo and the thousands not going to school, get formal education, for education is the only empowering tool that opens many doors to opportunity.

 It is only an educated woman who can say ‘no’ to someone trampling on her rights. It is an educated woman who can competently plan her family. If you doubt this, check the average number of children women who haven’t gone to school have. An educated woman will decide how her family will be run and go ahead to ensure that everything is smooth.

The secret to achieving MDGs lies in educating women. If we crack this, we are on our way to achieving the goals. I hope President Kibaki comes back from the Summit with this agenda and we run with it as a country.