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WCFJC seeks to increase economic empowerment and improve the quality of life among low-income women in Africa. Project work has begun in Uganda, East Africa and will later spread throughout the continent of Africa.

Women's Day: A Rural Woman's Perspective (Part 1)

International Women’s Day and more broadly, International Women’s Month are significant for Women’s Center for Job Creation (WCFJC) for obvious reasons. We are about women to our very core and Women’s Month is our opportunity to celebrate that; to look at the ways in which our struggle for women’s economic empowerment is actually paying off and find ways to even better establish it.

This year, we wanted to see what our #WomenInBusiness had to say about Women’s Day. We were curious to see what the day actually means to a peri-urban/rural woman. How does she celebrate it? What does it signify for her? What things about womanhood would she like her daughters to pay attentions to? The responses received were interesting to say the least.

You would think that a lot of these women do not have the time to sit and reflect on such things. That dissecting the idea of womanhood is a little abstract. We love how wrong we were proven. These women understand the concept of inequality in such amazing ways. They appreciate the need for the empowerment of women demonstrated by the way they word their idea of women’s strength in such depth. We felt it was something you needed to experience, in their own words.

Caroline
“A woman is a mother of the nation. Despite that, especially in the African setting, women have been left behind in many ways. Women’s Day is in place to right that wrong; recognize women’s efforts, bring to attention all they do in the world. They produce and raise children. They are left to cater for the children at home. At some point they are the breadwinners of the home, the doctors, the ones who cook, they do all the donkey work at home. So whoever came up with Women’s Day wanted to celebrate these efforts. To encourage women, to appreciate them.
A woman means a mother. Someone who cares, who supports others. A person who is there to see others grow and support them in that growth.
Girls need to know that God made them in a special way, to nurture, to support. They have that special gift that is not found in the man, since God has blessed them with the nurturing bit they have the strength, the energy and the power to do it.”

Manisula
“We celebrate women’s day to renew each other. We are standing together as women. Finding ways to get better at what we do together.
A woman is identified by her leadership position in the family. Her first responsibility is to her children. Her sense of womanhood can be measured by how well she takes care of her family.
I would encourage you girls today to have good manners, stay in school, be disciplined and keep the cultural norms.”

Hajira
“Women’s Day is a day of recognition for us. We are seen without fighting hard to be. I celebrate every year and make sure my daughters do too.
Being a woman is linked to the home. A woman is someone that cares for their children, works hard and ensures her family is sustained.
Young girls, stay in school. You are the next teachers and doctors! Be disciplined and hospitable but never lose focus.”

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