Tag / womenempowerment

by Yumnah Jones

Oluwakemi Odusanya

Oluwakemi Odusanya, founder of Eagle’s Voice International for Disability Rights

Oluwakemi Odusanya, the founder of Eagle’s Voice International for Disability Rights is driven by her personal experience of living with a visual impairment. She is a disability-rights advocate, a freelance journalist, and holds a Master’s degree in Public and International Affairs. with aspirations to empower many blind women in Nigeria. Her story shows us that a disability can also be acquired and is not simply limited to birth, and that as human beings, we should always be cognizant of the fact that a disability can strike, anyone, at any given moment.

This is Oluwakemi’s story …

“This cannot happen to my child! We don’t have this disease in our lineage!”

My father’s words of anger, aggression and fear, was inflicted on my mother while she hid her pain beneath her beautiful smile, I was confused and wept myself to sleep every night. Little did I know that this was only the start of a new beginning.

Everything changed, in our lives, when at the age of 9 years, I tried to light a matchstick, to prepare dinner for our family. While I lit the matchstick, its particles entered my left eye causing me to feel dizzy and blurring my vision. My parents, thinking it was stress, tried to treat my situation with home remedies.

However, my vision only deteriorated with time, and four years later, my parents received the shocking diagnosis, that I have a retinal detachment in my right eye. My parents were initially shocked and in complete denial but being the eldest of four children and especially my father’s favourite, it was very painful for him to accept my condition but despite the emotional roller-coaster, my parents sought out professional treatment.

After several surgeries and a financial drain, I subsequently made the decision to discontinue with surgeries as there was no hope of recovery and I was tired of treating my eyes with surgical knives. I watched my life unravel, from what I knew it before and what it became after the incident. My self-esteem was at a very low point, my education came to a halt, my classmates deserted me and even my closest family members, my cousins, distanced themselves from me. It was very isolating while everyone pretended that everything would be alright.

At the failure of modern medicine, my parents took me to several herbal doctors, who made me bathe in the river, eat in the jungle, and drink concoctions, all in a bid to restore my sight but to no avail. A friend of my mother then advised her to enrol me in the Pacelli School For The Blind & Partially Sighted Children. It was at this respected school and rehabilitation centre, that I received the necessary skills training and education that facilitated my integration back into mainstream society. While my mother was supportive throughout my transition, it deeply bothered my father.

Wracked with guilt, he could not accept my blindness and would often have intense fights with my mother about it. He wanted my mother around me all the time, to shelter me, and would be mad if, for instance, she arrived home late from the market, as he told her she need to babysit me at all times. All these altercations lowered my confidence, and most times, I wanted to escape from the chaos at home but my mother forged ahead and ensured that I become independent.

After completion of secondary school, I enrolled for a degree in Mass Communication at the University of Lagos. During my studies, I realized that there were only a few women, with disabilities, in university and the reasons were because some could not use the computer independently while others were battling with accepting their disabilities. To prevent myself from becoming a frustrated and lonesome blind woman, I decided to participate in every available activity on campus.

During my second year, I developed a sensitization programme for the university’s campus radio, which aimed to change the mindset and perceptions on disabilities. As a result, my self-confidence increased and communication skills improved. However, the opportunity to join the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) in Nigeria, after graduation, was a liberating experience.

The National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) is a one-year mandatory service for Nigerian graduates, not older than 30 years, where they are expected to work in a social organization, in line with their studies, but outside of their respective states. Being born and raised in Lagos State, I was posted to Zamfara State, in the Northern parts of Nigeria, a whole 24-hour bus ride from home. Now imagine a blind girl travelling solo, no parents or siblings to protect her or friends to guide her.

Being in the comforts of my home and familiar surroundings, my whole life, this opportunity to explore came at such a great time where I was learning more about my own capabilities. The solo experience strengthened my mobility skills, gave me the confidence to travel alone, and helped me to improve my communication skills and self-resilience. I realized every girl and woman, with a disability, should be given the opportunity, to travel, to discover herself. After three weeks on campground in Zamfara State, I was redeployed to Lagos State for better accessibility and to begin my primary place of assignment at a radio station.

My path from a sighted young girl to a woman, with a visual impairment, which was shaped and inspired by my mother’s unrelenting support and unconditional love, motivated me to want to create a space of change for young women, such as myself, who were not given the opportunities I was given. In 2022, Eagle’s Voice International for Disability Rights was established to equip blind women in Nigeria with basic 21st century skills, to enable them to be self-resilient and to attain leadership roles in media, politics and corporate society. Our vision is to see blind women as active drivers in the Nigerian economy and a Nigerian society that both respects and values visually-impaired women as contributing citizens.

Eagle’s Voice International for Disability Rights, since it inception, participated in many projects and activities. In 2023, we partnered with the Nigeria Association of the Blind, to provide 2-month training to empower ten blind and partially sighted women, in the Lagos metropolis, with computer orientation, community awareness and mobility skills. We also collaborated with non-governmental organizations (NGOs), in Lagos, to organize workshops and seminars, that equipped blind women with essential skills in communication, critical thinking and technical proficiency.

Currently, we are upscaling the leadership skills training project with support of the pollination project, at the University of Lagos, by training twenty blind and partially sighted women, including men, with skills in computer proficiency, communication and emotional intelligence, and orientation and mobility. The training commenced in January 2024 and will conclude in April 2024. The projects and activities have expanded our knowledge and made us aware of a much greater need and capacity to train more women with visual impairments and to demystify the negative perception of people with disabilities.

Although impact can never be measured, many participants have been greatly impacted by our projects and activities, inspiring them in becoming more confident and daring in their aspirations and maximization of their potential. Sensing and watching them bloom is always such a pleasure for everyone involved and we want more of this impact to the extent that we see more people with disabilities in the ministerial sphere of society, where no blind and visually impaired person has ever ventured within Nigerian society. More people with disabilities at the top-tier of society consequently means more impact and positive change for their fellow beings at grassroot level. With this in mind, every action and thought of Eagle’s Voice International for Disability Right is governed by this purpose.

When reflecting on my growth and development and thinking on the different, yet well-meaning, parenting styles of both my parents, I am immensely grateful that even if my father did not initially agree with my mother’s decisions, that she stood her ground in exposing me to the outside world. Any parent want to protect their children but to shelter a child with disabilities will not benefit any such child in the long run. It is best to emphasize on their developments, yet at the same time, to be respectful of their limitations, in helping them navigate their surroundings. Being assertive in their growth is not the same as tough love, because tough love without respect is damaging to their growth.

Thus, the same analogy can be used in dealing with and including people with disabilities in society. To possess disabilities does not automatically equate someone to being incompetent or incapable. The best gift a parent, an organization or society can offer them is to expose children and people with disabilities to educational advancement, skills-training and empowerment projects that will facilitate their integration into and contribution towards mainstream society. 

If you are interested in learning more about Oluwakemi or would like to get in contact with her, please reach out via her website eaglesvoice.org, her Facebook page, Eaglesvoice_ng, or email her at kemiodusanya1@gmail.com.

by Yumnah Jones

Suraya Williams

Suraya Williams, founder of Design26 Foundation

Suraya Williams, the founder of the Design26 Foundation, has been featured in several local South African newspapers, media campaigns and has been awarded recognition for her contribution to the young women of the Cape Flats, through her skills empowerment programme. Her story shows us that the key to our destiny is often right in front of us and that no matter what path we choose to follow, it will keep bringing us back to what we need to do and when we persevere to answer that call, the level of impact and influence we leave in our wake, is momentous.

This is Suraya’s story…

I was born in Bonteheuwel, a suburb within the larger Cape Flats region of Cape Town, South Africa, that is often only associated with gangsterism, poverty and crime. My parents, with their growing family, lived in a backyard shack and the struggle to make ends meet, within a segregated coloured community, under the Apartheid regime, were both common but also our norm.

When I was 2 years of age, in 1979, my parents moved into their own home, in Rocklands, Mitchell’s Plain; another area within the segregated Cape Flats. My father was a paint contractor and my mother was a clothing factory worker, with both of them having obtained a primary school education.  

In 1984, my mother was retrenched, when most clothing manufacturing companies, in Cape Town, were closed down. Subsequently, she made the decision to use her seamstress skills and worked from home.  However, due to the lack of a formal education, she worked from hand to mouth, barely making a minimum wage.

As a little girl, growing up, I remember always standing alongside her while she did her sewing and cut-make and trim (CMT) work. She would always tell me, in these shared moments, that she wants me to continue in her footsteps when she passes on. I secretly scoffed at the idea of taking over from her, as I believed it was a dying industry flooded with low-paid labourers destined for a life of continued poverty and destitution. I wanted better for my own life and sewing was not what I associated with having or doing better.

Determined to do better, and to help our parents in our own small way, my older sister and I, aged 14 years, would work for a salon on weekends and earned R30 (US$2) and a plate of food. In 1992, aged 15, during Grade 10, I started working for Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) after school hours and during weekends, earning R450 (US$29) every second weekend. In 1996, I finally graduated from secondary school, after failing Grade 10, at first attempt, but through sheer persistence and focus, I finished school, at aged 19.

Upon completion of secondary school, I did a one year secretarial course that enabled me to get my first formal job as a receptionist, at a community newspaper house, Cape Flats Mirror and Muslim Views. After a one year stint, I saw an opportunity to progress as a secretary at a much bigger company and in 1999, secured the job. However, a few years later, I got retrenched, in 2004, but soon thereafter, I became employed as an administrator at a well-known accounting and auditing firm, Mazars. Within two years of being employed, I progressed from being an administrator to becoming a personal assistant to two directors at the firm.

I have had to hustle all my life to get to this level of ease, from being a child of menial workers to working in the corporate sector but just when things seemed to be falling into place, my life was, unknowingly at the time, starting to shift gears, and steered me onto a pathway that was always meant to be my destiny.

In 2006, my mother passed away of yellow jaundice. Her death was sudden and shocking. Two weeks after she was diagnosed, all her organs failed and sadly she passed away, on my birthday, the 26th of January. She bequeathed her sewing machines and all her dressmaking equipment and fabrics to me; the middle child of her five children, but I was just as disinterested in sewing then as I was while growing up. I was not prepared though to dispose of it just yet, as it held sentimental value, and instead stored the sewing machines in the garage, until I found a suitable candidate to give them to.  

Three months after my mother’s passing, my brother was murdered as he was a state witness to another murder. It was hard losing two family members in quick succession. I then decided to have another child, who was unfortunately born with a weak immune system. With a sickly baby and being in and out of hospitals, while shouldering other responsibilities, compounded by increasing responsibilities at work, this subsequently interfered with my career. I was not in an emotionally good space to deal with the trauma and hardships but I somehow soldiered on because I was afraid of losing my financial independence.

During one incident of having to be home to tend to a sick baby, I was approached by my cousin who insisted that I make her child a 21st birthday dress. I flatly refused but she was persistent saying that I have the machinery, left her fabric with me and stated that my mother used to be the one making dresses for the family and I should give it a try.

Weeks passed by and her fabric started to haunt me. as her child’s 21st birthday party drew closer. Eventually, one Saturday morning, I thought let me just give this a try and if I mess up, she is well aware of me never having sewed in my life. I called her up to bring her daughter over for measurements and then the magic started to happen. Everything I thought I did not know, I knew. I made that dress from the memories of seeing my mother making dresses. It was a complete out of body experience. It felt as if my mother was with me in spirit guiding my hands, in every cut, every trim, and every measurement. I never knew I was capable of this. Needless to say, my first beautifully made pumpkin-styled dress and bolero jacket were a success. To have created it from scratch and to see the kind of joy I brought to my family changed me internally and a dream within me, my mother’s dream, was born.

I went about my normal, daily life, striving to keep my financial independence, but the dream kept growing within me and presented me with mixed emotions and potential challenges. Do I leave my job to pursue something that I did not know anything about or do I stay in my comfort zone and sacrifice my soul’s desire? What do I do?  

After opening up to my husband about wanting to start my own clothing line, and with his full support, I handed in my resignation letter in September 2012. Instead of accepting the resignation letter, my directors made a counter-offer, offering me more money, which I accepted. I thought maybe more money is what I needed for the extra responsibilities that I had to take on but the feeling of wanting to make dresses and making women smile did not leave me. Two months later, after 14 years in the corporate world, I resolutely handed in my final resignation letter and embarked on my destined path.  

With no knowledge nor qualification of how to manage a business, I established Design26 (Pty) Ltd, a public company, in February 2013, in commemoration of my late mother and the significance of her passing and my birthdate. I started from my bedroom, with two inherited sewing machines and R500 (US$33) to open a bank account. I manufactured women’s ready-to-wear clothing, custom-made matric ball dresses and wedding dresses and each year, I would donate a matric ball dress to a less fortunate girl living in Mitchell’s Plain. Two years went by, and I realized I was selling dresses but without making a profit. I then enlisted in a small business management course offered by the University of Stellenbosch, at a discounted price, specifically for people living in the Mitchell’s Plain area. Through this course, I learnt skills on presentation, marketing and financial management and realized that in order to be charitable, and make a difference, I need to ensure that I am profitable.      

Fast forward to 2018, I have been donating matric ball dresses for several years now and would follow up with each of my customers on whether they passed secondary school and enquired about their future plans. The common response I would get is that they cannot afford to further their studies and some struggled to find employment because they lacked working experience or skills. Since many of them could not find employment, they then turned to one of the many social ills that clouded the Cape Flats; teenage pregnancies.   

Teenage pregnancies is a scourge that deeply affects the lives of young girls living in the Cape Flats. A third of girls, between the ages of 15 and 20, fall pregnant, each year, and instead of things improving, it appears to be getting worse. The problem is not always solved through the use of contraceptives. It goes deeper than this; it can be influenced or directly impacted by other social factors such as an unstable home environment, drug and alcohol abuse, gender-based violence, gangsterism and crime and high rates of unemployment.

The circumstances of these girls really affected me and galvanized me to be more involved by imparting my skills to them. I then registered the Design26 Foundation, a non-profit organisation and public benefit entity, and set about offering a free sewing skills training course for underprivileged girls, from the ages of 15 to 20, from Mitchell’s Plain and the greater Cape Flats area, with the hope of making them employable, self-sustainable and restoring dignity to women in my community. 

To date, the Design26 Foundation has assisted 104 women; 50% of them are working class women, over the ages of 20, who attended our paid courses, to start their own businesses or to sew as a side hustle or for their personal needs. The other 50% are teenage mothers or underprivileged girls, between the ages of 15 and 20 years, which we offer our sewing skills training course to, for free of charge. Both salaried and free courses, which are FP&M SETA (Fibre Processing and Manufacturing Sector Education and Training Authority) Accredited, are conducted over a 12 week or 6 month period.  40% of these women have started their own businesses. The Design26 Foundation also have an alumni programme that provides further mentoring and opportunities to the women who attended our courses and shared networks, in  which these women have access to our premises and are able to make use of our machinery to improve the quality of their products.

Currently, with 3 directors, of which I am actively involved in the day to day operations of the organization, and 2 qualified facilitators. who became qualified through our skills training programme, the Design26 Foundation provide these weekly classes on a Monday, Tuesday and Saturday, from 8h30 to 12h30, in an adjoining section to my house.  We are only able to accommodate five ladies per class, due to space constraints. However, we are in the process of securing land to develop a fully operational skills center in Mitchell’s Plain and to expand our skills training course, with an in-house CMT (cut-make and trim) factory, to be able to provide employment opportunities to women who completed our skills programme.

As the founder of Design26, I hope to reach out to more young girls, to start them off with skills during their most formative years, and to keep them focused on the future. The social reality of these young girls in the Cape Flats are often daunting and disempowering and can easily distract them from a life that they are capable of achieving. However, success is still within their reach if they stay focused. My message to these young girls; teenage mothers or not, is that there are organizations out there, like ours, that care about your well-being and while success may seem outside of your reach, with consistent effort, time and dedication, it is achievable.

If you are interested in learning more about Suraya or would like to get in contact with her, please follow her on her Facebook page, https://web.facebook.com/design26foundation or email her at info@design26foundation.org.za