African Home-Based Caregiver Women Speak of Undervalued Work – World Social Forum – Huairou

Grassroots women from Kenya, Uganda, Cameroon and Nigeria began the
second day of the World Social Forum today, singing and dancing their way around
the Moi International Sports Centre. They drew attention to the way that they,
home-based caregivers and organizers of the Home-Based Care Alliance in Africa,
are turning the HIV/AIDS Pandemic into a development opportunity.

After
the march, members of GROOTS convened at the GROOTS Kenya booth, fielding
questions and sharing information about their movement with donors, friends,
media and other interested people. At least four members of GROOTS were
interviewed by various media (including the BBC), and were able to raise the
visibility of their local work, and their national and international networks,
including the Home-Based Care Alliance and GROOTS International.

“Civil society is taking too long to recognize the capacity of grassroots
women.” –Esther Mwaura-Muiru

GROOTS members continued to raise the visibility of their largely
un-recognized work at a workshop attended by over 400 people this afternoon,
entitled “Turning the HIV/AIDS Pandemic into a Development Opportunity.” In this
workshop, facilitated by Esther Mwaura-Muiru, Mathilde, a caregiver from the
Uganda Community Based Organization for Child Welfare (UCOBAC) along with
Jenipher and Violet from GROOTS Kenya shared the ways that they are using the
opportunities presented by the tragedy of HIV/AIDS to improve their communities
and the position of women in society.

Mathilde began the presentations by discussing the ways that social fabrics
in Africa have been torn apart by colonialism and capitalism, which have
promoted individualism and destroyed many traditional family groups. When the
AIDS pandemic came about, Mathilde explained, people began to grow closer and
have created groups that are re-creating what has been lost.

One example is home-based care groups. Home- based caregivers demonstrate
heart felt motivation to help those dear to them cope with HIV/AIDS. Drawn by
need, they have reached out to wider communities as well. They have also aided
people living with HIV to form support groups and have begun supporting orphans
through direct resource provision, training them to care for themselves, and
providing them with equipment (such as sewing machines) to turn that training
into a source of livelihood. Mathilde also brought up the Home-Based Care
Alliance, which has been piloted by GROOTS Kenya and will now be launched by
UCOBAC in Uganda. This initiative has helped grassroots women to raise the
visibility of their work and to take advantage of many more opportunities
presented to them. “It is not good for HIV/AIDS to have come, but in many ways
it has improved our lives. When we are fragmented we cannot do much, but
together we will push together and be much more effective.”

Jenipher from Kitui, a dry region of Kenya, then explained the ways that
home-based caregivers are improving resource allocation at the local level.
Beyond starting income-generating activities to support their caregiving work,
they have begun to lobby for support for orphans and people living with HIV from
the wider community, thereby getting food, clothes and improved shelter for the
neediest. Grassroots women have also been lobbying for (and gaining) seats on
various community development committees, including bursary funds (to send
orphans to school), community development funds and constituency AIDS control
councils. Home-based caregivers are using their intimate knowledge of their
communities to ensure that resources flowing through these channels are going to
those most in need. “We knew that the government had money, but what would make
them appreciate the work we were doing? By coming together, and with our
capacity built, we are now sitting on committees on the strength of our work,
not by begging. The [development fund committees] are also benefiting. They have
been accused of corruption, but grassroots women are now there to watch over
what they do.”

“Give me my land; I don’t want to be bothered on the road.” –Western Kenyan
song

Violet then shared how the AIDS pandemic has spurred grassroots women and
communities to take up the issue of women’s land, housing and property rights.
Caregivers coming together at national meetings noticed that they were all
finding cases of women having to run away from their land when their husbands or
parents died of AIDS. Many of those women went to the slums, and with no other
way to survive, resorted to prostitution.

Using a community-led mapping process, the factors identified by grassroots
women were a lack of documents such as title deeds or death certificates; lack
of knowledge about their rights; and lack of effectiveness of the structures put
in place. Grassroots women reacted by increasing women’s awareness of their
rights, examining their culture (and through doing so discovering from
traditional opinion leaders that women had the right to inherit land), forming
support groups which contribute money to support women to go through legal
proceedings; and re-building homes for women who have been dispossessed. They
have also had dialogues and formed partnerships with chiefs to get women’s
property returned. Women now buy property in their own name. “The community
knows: if you disinherit a woman, we are watching and will deal with it as a
violation of human rights.” Violet ended by recommending that “you support us to
strengthen these initiatives.”

Esther wrapped up by asking, “Who would have thought before that grassroots
women could sit on committees where money decisions are made? Or influence where
governments put hospitals? We have all suffered so much do to HIV/AIDS. We have
lost our children, our homes, our parents and our spouses. But we can still now
talk about AIDS as an opportunity.”