Q&A with Susan Waffa-Ogoo
Ambassador of The Gambia to the United Nations
Shortly before this year’s session of the Commission on the Status of Women, Susan Waffa-Ogoo, Gambia’s Ambassador to the United Nations, sat down with a reporter to discuss women’s issues in her country, which is the smallest in Africa.
Waffa-Ogoo’s answers were edited for length.
Q: What opportunities do women have for employment?
A: Agriculture really is the backbone of the economy. Seventy percent of the workforce in Gambia is engaged in the agricultural sector. Within that figure, I can safely say the majority of those engaging are women. Because that’s where they get their livelihood.
Women in The Gambia tend to work year-round, fulltime. After the farming season, they also engage in gardening activities. They have to do that together with the other responsibilities of caregiving, taking care of the entire family, children, all the people.
The most hard-working, to my mind, is the rural women. Unfortunately, because they engage in farming—which is mainly subsistence farming—they don’t earn enough. You know, they put in a lot of hard work, but they don’t earn enough to be able to support themselves and their families.
That’s as far as employment goes. Let me also explain…a lot of emphasis has been placed on the education of the girl child. The government has taken several intiatives in this regard, mainly to offer scholarships to girls at the primary level. Primary education is free in The Gambia. However, once the kids graduate the secondary level, the school fees and other school materiels tend to put a lot of pressure on the parents, especially those who are coming from very poor families and from the rural areas.
Q: Is this more in recent years that the government has taken these steps?
Well, yes. As far back as ten years now.
About fifteen years ago, the government felt there were a lot of primary schools, but there were not enough secondary schools. Seventy percent were in the rural areas, but the high schools were mainly in the urban areas…Most students were losing out on continuing education.
This is why, now, the policy is that every district needs to have a secondary school.
And of course, we also had the situation where, in the event that the family could not afford to send all the children to school, in the rural areas, they usually made the choice of sending the boys. Because they felt, in the culture, girls are married off, and boys can go on, complete school, higher education, and all that.
In this area as well, the government has taken very firm steps. It is illegal to remove the girl child from school early in order to get married.
Q: And what happens for girls who feel pressured into a marriage at a young age?
A: If that happens, and it comes to the attention of the authorities, they will take firm steps. Because it’s illegal now in the Gambia to marry young girls off, especially when they are still attending school.
Q: What age is it legal?
A: In the Gambia, the age of maturity is eighteen, according to the constitution. So before they reach eighteen, really, it would be illegal to marry them off.
Q: The fifty-third session of the Commission on the Status of Women is coming up soon…What would you like to see happen there?
A: I think one of the key things is caregiving, in the context of HIV/AIDS. It’s mainly the women…where the burden of caregiving rests squarely. For the women, I mentioned that you have a full-time occupation—housework, caregiving, household chores, taking care of your family, farming activities, and also other activities so that they can supplement the income of their family.
Apart from all that, they also take care of sick members of their family.
I feel that it’s time we talked about these things, and raised awareness. I know you cannot change the status quo overnight. But let us raise awareness and bring it to the floor. Let us show that the international community is aware of the burdens that women have to bear. And find ways of alleviating some of these burdens.