CULTURE-AFRICA: Cultural Stereotypes Remain Major Hurdles in AIDS Battle

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Joyce Mulama

NAIROBI, Sep 29 2003 (IPS) - In a remote village in South Nyanza District, western Kenya, Lawrence Orawa is known as "jater", (loosely translated as widow cleanser). His work is to perform a sexual act with women whose husbands have passed away, a ritual meant to "cleanse" the home and chase away "evil spirits".

One of his victims is a bitter Florence Awino (not her real name), who is convinced her HIV-positive status is a result of this act. "My husband died five years ago from a road accident. The elders forced me to undergo this ritual," she said in an interview with IPS.

"First, I refused but they told me that if I did not comply, a bad omen would befall me and my children. They also threatened to chase me out of the home. I did not have much choice since I was depending on the family land for my income. Now my health is all withered. I wish I knew," she regrets.

In the case of Vivianne Kanyore, a 45-year-old woman from Northern Uganda, she became infected with HIV/AIDS by her promiscuous husband who could not stand using a condom.

"I knew he was not straight since he had many girlfriends out there. I feared for my life, and I started asking him to use a condom," Kanyore (not her real name), a participant at the just concluded 13th ICASA conference, told IPS in an exclusive interview.

"The first time I talked of a condom, I got the experience of my life. He hit me until I got a black eye. He even accused me of being promiscuous. The second time I mentioned it, he told me he was the man of the house and if I was not ready to have sex with him, he would chase me and our three children out of the house," she further said.

These two scenarios bring to the fore the role tradition and cultural norms play in increasing the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa. They fall under gender injustices, which have been said to work against women in the midst of an AIDS epidemic.

Current statistics reveal that an estimated 29 million people in sub-Saharan Africa are living with HIV/AIDS. About 58 percent of those infected are women.

Gender experts have often maintained that traditions and cultural stereotypes are a major stumbling block in the fight against the pandemic.

At a satellite conference during the ICASA meeting held in Nairobi, Kenya last week, Dr Musa Dube, a consulting theologian with the World Council of Churches Ecumenical HIV/AIDS Initiative in Africa, noted that however hard women tried to protect themselves from the disease, it proved difficult because they did not have an upper hand in sexual matters.

"Traditions and customs do not provide for women to abstain. Things to do with abstinence by women have not worked because traditional and societal stereotypes dictate that men have an upper hand in matters to do with sex," she observes.

Gender reports have often asserted that society has created stereotypes implying that it is a sign of manhood to be able to control intimate relationships. Females are on the other hand brought up to believe that men are the bosses in all aspects of life, including during sexual encounters.

There are concerns also, that the low level of education among girls in Africa impedes the battle against the disease.

"Low level of schooling and education among girls and women means that they cannot get their hands on information concerning HIV/AIDS, and this means vulnerability to infection," stresses Carol Sande, chairperson of the Nairobi-based Campaigners for an AIDS Free Society (CAFS).

Traditional portrayal of men as strong and women as the weaker sex has also contributed immensely to the vulnerability of women to the disease. "Men can use their physical power; violence to prevent women from accessing information on the pandemic," she adds.

A study carried out in Uganda by Human Rights Watch indicates that fear of violence from their spouses prevents many women from accessing HIV/AIDS information, from being tested for HIV infection and from receiving HIV/AIDS treatment and counselling.

"Women attended HIV/AIDS clinic in secret, and were afraid to discuss HIV/AIDS with their husbands, even when they suspected that the men were positive and were the source of their own infection," says the report titled, Just Die Quietly: Domestic Violence and Women’s Vulnerability to HIV in Uganda.

Experts have often warned that without addressing gender biases, the fight against HIV/AIDS will not bear much fruit.

A commitment to tackle gender imbalances in order to reduce women’s vulnerability to HIV/AIDS was displayed on September 22 when Africa’s First Ladies vowed to campaign against stigma and gender discrimination created through traditional and societal stereotypes.

The wives of Africa’s presidents met under the Organisation of African First Ladies Against AIDS (OAFLA), aside the 13th ICASA. (ENDS/IPS/AF/EA/CR/JM/SM/03)

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