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Traditions Keep African Women Oppressed

LUBUMBASHI, Democratic Republic of Congo — Simone Maganga still feels deep shame when she recalls how, after her husband died, she was obliged to have sex with his younger brother in order to put the deceased’s spirit to rest.

“In order to remove your husband’s dead body from your body, you must sleep with his little brother,” said Maganga, a member of the Hemba tribe in the southeast of the country. “Otherwise, you are told, you will start to see your husband wherever you go. It is a humiliation that is difficult to forget.”

Maganga found the ordeal particularly difficult because her husband’s brother is roughly the same age as her own son.

Women’s rights groups say that such traditional practices create an environment in the Democratic Republic of Congo in which women are perceived to have little value in society, making them more likely to be targets of sexual or physical abuse.

Others say, however that while tribal customs contribute to the marginalization of women, the years of warfare the country has suffered are leading directly to increases in rape and sexual abuse.

“What we are seeing in the DRC is a new phenomenon directly associated with the conflict,” said Lyric Thompson, an international policy analyst at advocacy group Women for Women. “Rape has been widely used as a weapon of war. As soldiers have returned home, violence and abuse against women has moved into domestic life.”

Thompson said that this phenomenon is not unique to the DRC, but is characteristic of post-war conflict environments all over the world.

She notes, however, that the DRC is one of the worst places in the world to be a woman right now, since there are almost no systems in place to offer adequate protection.

Some acts against women are prohibited under Congolese law, but still widely practiced in rural villages across the country.

Two specific examples are forced marriages and sexual intercourse with girls under the age of 18.

“Marriages with minors occur almost daily in our villages,” said Isabelle Musonda, a student at Lubumbashi’s university. “Where is the Congolese state in such cases?”

George Simba, a magistrate, says that national law should be applied throughout the DRC, without discrimination, regardless of whether people live in a village or in a city.

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