Is the law keeping young African women safe from sexual violence?
It may be 2016, but young Nigerian girls are still being exploited by those who should be protecting them. I’m referring to the father figures, lawmakers, community leaders and even some parents. Only recently, the internet and media went into a frenzy over the notion that the age of consent had been lowered from 18 to 11. The reason for this confusion? A bunch of subsections under Section 7 of the Sexual Offences Bill postulating penalties for sexual penetration in girls under the ages of 11, 15 and 18. We’re all still asking ourselves why the need to highlight these three ages rather than the relevant one which is 18. This is of major concern as concerns two main areas: child marriages and rape. Source: BBC Africa UNICEF reports that Nigeria is the country with the highest number of child brides across Africa. The number of child brides across Africa is expected to almost triple by the year 2050. It’s been almost 2 years now since the world has been fighting for the return of the Chibok girls following the #BringBackOurGirls campaign. Sadly, at this time, we are still waiting and hoping that they are rescued. Ese’s story Most people have been following the story of 14-year-old Ese Oruru who was abducted from her base by a man who took her to the North to become his bride. Reports made by the Bayelsa State Police Command as captured in Punch Newspaper state that her recent kidnapping from her home in Bayelsa to faraway Kano is a case of eloping. It’s almost laughable except that it’s not. This is a grave issue that affects every one of us regardless of gender. It thus becomes obvious that law enforcement and the rest of the community have failed to catch on that the law does not condone the violation of any woman especially one who is still a child. Ese’s predicament is our predicament and as such statements made by the very institution put in place to install law and order demonstrates our failure as a society. How on earth does a teenager elope? The fact that such a statement can be made by the police public relations rep confirm to us that child marriages are still very much a thing in this part of the world. This is a practice prevalent in the northern part of the country where matured men take on child brides. At this point of the century where societies are moving to expel inhumane practices, the reaction to Ese’s case is a prime example of the normalcy of such a practice. Whether or not Ese voluntarily left her base in Bayelsa for a faraway state or was kidnapped / coerced into doing so as certain assertions have been made, the baseline is she is still a minor. Although it has taken six whole months, the good news is Ese has been handed over to the police for her return to her family in Bayelsa. Just as author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has been quoted as saying, ‘culture does not make people, people make culture’. Thus, the mere fact that something is a part of our culture is not a good enough reason to uphold it. There is certainly good culture and bad culture and as humans we are expected to evolve and be progressive. What are some of the risks? There are several risks that child brides are faced with including emotional and psychological trauma that may follow them way into adulthood and in fact for the rest of their lives In addition, if the ‘marriage’ had been consummated underage, pregnancy, Vesicovaginal Fistula and STIs are all common occurrences for child brides. As a society, where do we go from here? We need to close the gap between the law and its practice through proper information dissemination and sensitization. The Nigerian police force must undertake reorientation programs with the passing of new laws. The law should expressly state the age of consent for sexual intercourse by getting rid of the compounding subsections in the Sexual Offences Bill. It is also not enough that the law prescribe a penalty of 5 years imprisonment or a fine of N500,000 for the perpetrators in child marriages! A part of her life is taken away from her as she is forced to grow up in the worst ways possible. The maximum penalty should be sought for such offenders. What can we do as women? As women, each of us has a responsibility to uplift other women especially those who do not have some of the privileges we do have. Speak up about it! Challenge the status quo! Tweet about it, blog about it, discuss with peers, make your voice heard. You may be surprised how little people actually think about this issue. Educate yourselves including other young girls and women. Females need to be aware of the dangers they face and to take extra precaution where necessary. Counsel and encourage one another. As women we need to quit slut shaming and blaming the victim. The guilty party is the aggressor or manipulator. Skimpy clothing or a flirtatious nature do not equal a license to rape. Parents and guardians also need to be receptive enough for their daughters to feel free enough to tell them about any funny business going on. Raise your sons to respect women. Men have as much a part to play as women do in the promotion of gender rights.
Smoothie Express: Bringing healthy food to the people
SLA quickly caught up with Tracy and Omowunmi the founders of fast growing fresh food startup Smoothie Express. They shared with us how they developed the idea for the company, how they get around volatile currencies and the best piece of feedback they’ve ever received from a customer. Where did the idea of Smoothie Express come from and how did you get it started? I was trying to do a smoothie detox and my biggest challenge was finding the right time to blend my smoothies as I was still working a 9-5 then. That’s where the idea came up, I had seen a problem that was not peculiar to me alone and I wanted to solve it. So I contacted Omowunmi and we both developed a solution for the problem hence, Smoothie Express. We first of all picked a name, Smoothie Express because we wanted to make fresh smoothies available to customers with minutes. Then we registered the company. We used our savings in starting up the company. We had to prioritize our capital expenditure because funds were limited. Why is healthy food so important to you? As adults, we have the tendency to go by our lives eating any piece of unhealthy food just to keep body and soul going. With lots of diseases coming up and ill health associated with being overweight, the best and easiest way to keep your health in check is to eat healthy. Healthy food plays an important role in our health and it’s important for me to indulge as much as possible. What is the most challenging element of running a food startup? I would say quality control for a food start up. Customers expect nothing less than perfect food/beverage not withstanding anything, all the time. So as a food company, you have to make sure there is quality control checks all day everyday. How has currency fluctuation affected your business and what are you doing to creatively manage it and keep your products affordable? We have always been a company that believes in patronizing Nigerian products. It’s been a struggle everywhere, but we have been able to manage the currency situation because of that. Although, we are struggling with increased prices for a few items. It’s such a shame how dollar still controls our economy this much. What is the best thing and the worst thing about having a business partner? The best thing about having a business partner is that, there is always someone to cover your weaknesses and loops. The worst thing about having a business partner is that you guys get to disagree a lot of times but the ability to push past it makes it worthwhile. What is the best piece of feedback you’ve ever received from a customer? Oh well. A couple of customers say we make the best smoothies in the world. If you’d like to share your story with She Leads Africa, let us know more about you and your story here.
Why we need business education in the African market
When considering female micro-entrepreneurship in sub-Saharan Africa, I often remember the stark images of the women of Yaba market in Lagos. Some of the market women sell food produce, others focus on the textile business and a greater number work as the “Jacquelines” of all trades. I often wonder if they designed and wrote out a business plan before they started their respective ventures and how they and their businesses have survived through the years. More importantly, I think about what can make their businesses more profitable and sustainable. During my last trip to Nigeria, I spent a few hours buying gifts at Yaba market and engaging different micro-scale womenpreneurs. My goal was to gain insight as to how these women got started in business, how their businesses were structured and what their biggest needs were. Unsurprisingly, many women talked about limited access to loans and credit. However, I was more struck by the desire of many of the women to get an education. The conversations inspired me to think of creative and effective ways to empower women in the market with customized business skills and education. I dug deeper to gain a clearer understanding of what can be done to empower these women, many of whom didn’t complete secondary school but still had a strong desire to obtain some formal education. The biggest challenge to getting formal education for many of these women was time, money and the opportunity cost of leaving their businesses for extended periods of time. Many women simply could not leave their kiosks during business hours to attend class at a school that would most likely be far away. While auditing a Coursera class on Social Entrepreneurship, I applied the Principles of Design to the problem. My solution: take the training and education to the women. I crafted a model that will function as a daily or weekly lunch-and-learn, allowing micro-womenpreneurs leave their kiosks for forty-five minutes to an hour and take skills-focused business classes at a location within the market infrastructure. To increase the chances of success, the program must be skills-focused and be offered in bite-sized digestible format. Many of these women manage shops, stalls and boutiques; hence they need an education that is timely, tailored and convenient. Listed below are the reasons that having a skills-focused business school in the market will be beneficial to small-scale women entrepreneurs: Timeliness and applicability of information Given the focus on skills-based learning and real time application of information, women can learn about how to build a budget and exercise their knowledge of different commerce topics on their businesses the same day. Their learning is further complemented by their respective business challenges, which can serve as case studies from which everyone else can learn. Additionally, women can real time advice from their teachers, mentors and fellow womenpreneurs. Creation of a Womenpreneur ecosystem A market-based schooling approach creates a network of entrepreneurial women who come together to share business experiences, engage with business lessons, and form a coalition. This creates a support system whereby women can rely on each other for support or even micro-credit; an ecosystem where women can share issues they are having in their businesses and find ways to learn from each other’s experiences promises to create trust among the women. Women may also discover that they are serving different levels of the business chain and may decide to integrate or partner; hence creating potential value to be realized in efficiency gains. Convenience and flexibility It is difficult to convince a middle-aged woman who is the breadwinner of her family to leave her kiosk for hours at a time to attend school. However, if that education is right there in the market and is fitted into mini-education sessions, it creates a more compelling and readily available opportunity. Bringing education to the micro womenpreneurs creates the flexibility that has been missing in obtaining an education. The Girl effect Many of the women I’ve seen running shops over the years tend to have some help from another younger woman. Usually, it’s a daughter or a niece or a relation of some sort. Some of these relationships with younger women can be structured as apprenticeships with defined learning outcomes, which further fuel the entrepreneurial spirit of the young women. Coupling that structure with formal education (right there in the market) can create a powerful domino effect for years to come. A program of this nature can take many forms. There are number of parties from the private, public and non-profit sectors who could come in as partners. From a funding perspective, the program can be sponsored through philanthropy, whether from an NGO, the government or a Private Corporation. It can also be structured as a public-private partnership. While there are obstacles facing women entrepreneurship, most of these are in fact solvable. Education continues to be a primary issue, however, with some creative thinking we can develop meaningful responses and improve these solutions as ideas further develop.
Efena Otobo: It is not how you get knocked down but whether you get back up
Perseverance. Determination. Willpower (PDW). To a person without struggle or strife these words are merely scribbles on a blank piece of paper or some abstract notion or a catchy mantra on the walls of a gym. However, when life suddenly takes an unexpected, drastic turn and plunges you into an abyss filled with mind-boggling agony, emotional turmoil and a seemingly bottomless pool of despair, one truly has a stark realization and a deep understanding of PDW. When you feel like you are drowning, trying to gasp for air as waves of struggle keeps pushing you below the surface – the challenges facing you, constant tides pulling you in all sorts of directions – the sheer force of will to swim against the current is the very definition of persevering. Setting the scenes Two years ago, one single moment caused a ripple effect and altered the course of my life in an unimaginable way. On the 21st of April 2014, Easter Monday, an unnecessary car accident in Yaba, Lagos, Nigeria involving two drivers and one passenger shifted my understanding of the world. Immediately after the crash, I looked down at my misshaped, lifeless legs and I knew that something had gone terribly wrong. In a matter of minutes, I was carefully lifted out of the car and placed on a little chair. Amid the chaos, voices and confusion, a scary feeling gnawed at my soul – life, as I knew it, was never going to be same. I spent the next five days flat on my back in excruciating pain, the kind of inexplicable agony that is difficult to comprehend, in four different local hospitals from Victoria Island to Igbobi to Ikeja. I was poked and prodded, underwent several medical tests, scans, endured sleepless nights, hunger, thirst and incompetent doctors. The knowledge and the hope that an ‘angel of mercy’, in the form of an air ambulance bound for London, England, would save me from the torrent of suffering gave me the determination to grit my teeth and survive the medical purgatory I was in. On Sunday, the 27th of April 2014, after a five hour back surgery, I found out I had sustained a complete T4 spinal cord injury caused by a T12/L1 fracture. In plain English, I had broken my lower back which rendered me paralysed from just below my chest all the way down to my toes and here’s the punchline – there was very little chance of ever walking again. The First Act Debilitating pain became the norm but I knew that finding strength through adversity was the only path to take. I had to summon every ounce of willpower to relearn how my ‘new’ body worked and moved. Imagine being taught the ‘art’ of rolling over in your late twenties, being instructed by an occupational therapist the best way to put your shirt over you head or how to sit up straight and balance so you can feed yourself. How undignified do you think I felt? How could I possibly survive and move forward? The answer is simple, yet complex – “The toughest steel is forged in the hottest fire” (Unknown, Chinese wisdom). With this new mindset, physiotherapy was not an obstacle but a challenge to build up muscular strength. Meetings with the neuropsychologist presented opportunities to equip myself to battle depression and emotional conflict; the confines of the hospital was not a prison but rather an avenue to foster positive relationships that enhanced my mental stability. The soul-crushing diagnosis from the doctors was a suggestion, not a declaration or conclusion. I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I was going to not only walk, but run, skip, jump and dance again. The Second Act Ask any young woman today to regale you with tales of her most trying times in life and how she emerged victorious, the replies will definitely have certain things in common. Rising like a phoenix from the ashes of struggle takes perseverance, determination and willpower. One has to harness the innate ability to utilize strength through adverse circumstances. It is not how you get knocked down but whether you get back up. Focusing on the light at the end of the tunnel culminates in what I like to call the Spirit of Invictus; in other words an unconquerable force to be reckoned with. Going to rehabilitation five times a week, in spite of the constant neuropathic pain in my legs and back – in order to build upper body strength, learning how to execute a safe multi level transfer from the wheelchair to the plinth and figuring out the best ways to manipulate my restricted mobility to achieve a desired result, required a level of perseverance beyond the ordinary. Enduring extreme discomfort became the ideal persevering tool I needed to succeed and excel, to rebuild what I lost and overcome the insurmountable challenges that lay before me. In essence, to achieve the extra-ordinary, one has to push beyond the realm of normalcy and endure the physical pain, mental torture, sleepless nights, financial struggles and emotional turmoil otherwise known as the uncomfortable and unwanted sacrifices that come with the territory associated with the extraordinary. Curtain Call In the face of all the anger, disappointment, agony, confusion and dismay, my faith and hope burned brighter than ever. I was determined to not allow the wheelchair define who I was. Living life to the fullest once again became a top priority. Wine tasting in the vineyards of Napa Valley, sitting in awe at the San Diego Comic Convention, appreciating the beauty of nature in Carlsbad, hoping to spot a celebrity in Beverly Hills, screeching with delight at the dolphins in Sea World, marveling at the millions of Christmas lights at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens, clutching my sides from laughing too hard at the jokes in The Book of Mormon production at the Fox Theatre on Atlanta’s Broadway, being gobsmacked at the wonder of ocean life at the Georgia Aquarium
Louisa Kinoshi: Be OK with failure, that’s how you learn
Louisa Kinoshi created BeautyRevNg to celebrate the diverse beauty of African women. The Nigeria-based company, which officially launched in April 2014, aims to revolutionize the beauty shopping experience in Africa. It seeks to put brands that cater to the needs of African women in its clients’ hands at the click of a button. BeautyRevNg also provides an online space for African beauty enthusiasts to gather and learn from each other. “It is more than just selling makeup,” said Louisa, who is also a fashion and beauty blogger, and has written for various online publications. Before relocating to Nigeria to work on BeautyRevNG full-time, she worked for Clean Line Energy in Houston. Prior to that, she worked in corporate public relations and marketing for seven years. Her clients included Starbucks, Pepsico and Pfizer, among others. I caught up with her to talk about her entrepreneurial journey so far. Light-bulb moment The idea to start a beauty business came about when Louisa was at Carnegie Mellon University. As a student, she often travelled to Nigeria for holidays. During one of her trips, she lost her makeup bag. “It was a surprise that there was nowhere I could go to replace its contents at an affordable price,” she said. The few places that she did find sold the makeup that she wanted at exorbitant prices. She realized then that there was a need in the market for reasonably priced beauty products that compliment African women’s skin. “I also heard from family, friends and blog followers that this was something African women want to see,” she added. As a blogger, Louisa spend time figuring out what was missing in Africa’s beauty and fashion industry. She talked to people on the ground who shared their beauty wants and needs with her. She also cultivated relationships with beauty influencers, who included celebrity makeup artists and bloggers, in Nigeria. It is through this research that she was able to find out the type of products that her company would initially feature. The relationships she had built came in handy when the business started. It was easy to get people to join the beauty revolution because they had heard about it from these influencers. Louisa wanted to start small. This approach would give her leeway to make mistakes as she worked out the kinks of her business and tested to see if it was something that people really wanted. Armed with personal savings and a little bit of investment from family and friends, she embarked on turning the idea into reality. The first order of business was getting inventory. “We live in a society where there is scarcity of product so whoever has the most inventory is queen,”she said. “If you don’t have anything to sell then that’s a problem.” She then had to develop a website for the company. “I didn’t have to spend too much money on this,” she said. “I have web and graphic design experience so I did a lot of the web development myself.” Louisa had also fostered relationships with photographers and designers who agreed to work with her at a reduced cost. Growing the brand Louisa and her team, which consists of herself, a creative director and logistics manager, identify beauty companies to partner with through research and crowdsourcing. They first find out the brands that African women like, want and respect. “Respect is a really big factor,” Louisa said. “Then we ask, ‘Do these brands have products that cater to us?’” They then reach out to the brands to find out if they are willing to work with BeautyRevNG and have a foot in Africa. Louisa also travels to Los Angeles and attends trade shows where she can meet with the brand representatives in person. She lets them know about her company and her mission and vision. “Once we have an agreement with them, we bring the brands to our site and market them to our customers,” she said. Fostering these business partnerships has not been without its challenges. Some of the brands that customers desire don’t understand the opportunity in Africa yet. Others aren’t quite ready to have a presence in the continent. As such, they are not willing to form a wholesale relationship with BeautyRevNG. “There are also some popular indie brands that are owned by small businesses, but they are struggling to provide inventory for America so they can’t quite expand,” Louisa said. “It’s not their priority.” This doesn’t deter her because the beauty industry has so many options. “If one brand says no, it definitely doesn’t kill your business,” she said.“There are also new players coming in.” “If one doesn’t work there is always the next one,” she added. The company has also dealt with logistics challenges. Initially, it was tough to get the product from the website to the customers hands. “It would take almost three days in the same city,” said Louisa. She worked closely with her delivery partners in order to tackle this. “Now we are at a point where it takes 24 hours for most deliveries within the city.” Her goal is to cut down the product delivery time to 3 to 4 hours. “That would be the sweet spot,” she said. Powering the beauty revolution The startup sets itself apart from its competition by actively engaging with its clients. “From day one we have focused on building a community,” said Louisa. “So our brand voice has always been very inclusive.” Customers participate in the company’s story. They share pictures of products they have purchased from the store as well as beauty finds they are interested in. Through this online community, clients can also access tutorials and get beauty advice. “We are their friends,” said Louisa. “We are who they go to when they want to have conversations about beauty.” “Even if you aren’t purchasing at the time, we still want to engage you.” she added. This online community keeps Louisa going in the face of challenges. “People are always encouraging me