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By Joyce Gathu
Hawa Hussein and Amina Hussein have more in common than similar names.
They have the same height, are both slender and appear many years older than they actually are. In addition, each has eight children.
Although Amina was born in 1966 and Hawa in 1971, the nightmare of early marriage and childbearing has made the two share more experiences than their ages and physical traits.
The rigours of childbearing has left visible hard lines etched on their faces, a true testament of the tough times the women have lived.
Both epitomise the punishing impact of a retrogressive culture.
The women who were born, raised and married in Wajir, North Eastern, were forced into circumcision before being married to older men with breast milk still on their lips.
This saw the door for an education that could have changed their lives significantly, shut on them forever.
“It is this hard life that pushed us into starting a women group called Shukran. All of us have been through more or less similar situations. Besides early marriage and circumcision, we are also married to men who are much older than we are,” explains Hawa.
Hawa, who is the chairlady of this group, says they are 32 in number and despite the challenges of fighting a retrogressive culture that condemns the girl child, their spirits have not been dampened.
“We are fighting for the girls to have a chance to be much more than we have become, take more from life than we did,” says Amina.
Their aim is to ensure the girls get a chance to be educated and pursue their desired careers.
To save the girl-child from a similar fate, they trek for many Kilometres, giving talks in various schools and meeting women to share their point of view.
“It is a difficult mission, we often walk for at least eight kilometres to get our messages across. It also takes a long time to see results because most of the resistance is from the community. But now things are slowly changing,” says Hawa.
Although they came together about ten years ago, the early years of their campaign to protect girls in their small Sankuri village in Wajir, from having their genitals mutilated and married off to old men, were a lesson in perseverance.
“Often, women like us working in communities that circumcise girls get discouraged when they face opposition, but we shouldn’t give up,” says Hawa.
Unfortunately, those who perpetrate the female genital mutilation (FGM) are often old women who see themselves as the custodians of tradition.
Amina, who is now 41 years old, says having a host of young babies throughout her life, made it difficult to pursue economic opportunities.
Fortunately, the women under Shukran group have partnered to set up small businesses such as selling foodstuffs.
Albeit late for the women to reverse their fate, they are ready to do all that is in their power to rescue as many girls as possible from going through a similar destiny.
Thus they continue to trek many kilometres under the scorching sun, often barefoot, to ensure that girls in Wajir, get to take more from life than they ever did.
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