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In discussion groups in villages across Egypt, women are doing
more than just talking about health…they’re taking control of
their lives
Zohra
Village, El Minya, Egypt. July 2005
Every Wednesday morning, Tammem’s modest front room is filled to
capacity with 20 women and an assortment of their children, some
nursing. “What would you say if a rich man wanted to marry your
too-young daughter,” Tammem’s co-facilitator, Dalal, starts off
the discussion with a topic from the previous week.
“I would say no, she’s too young,” calls out one woman, a mother
of 3 daughters.
“The right age for a woman to marry is between 18 and 24,”
another voice sounds. “If she is younger, she can have
complications with pregnancy and she and the children could be
weakened,” the woman concludes. Heads nod in agreement.
Ms. Tammem Fathi Salama, 21, is an outreach worker from the
Community Development Association (CDA) in Zohra, a rural
village in the Governorate of El Minya. The community of Zohra,
similar to many throughout Egypt and the region, faces a wide
range of socio-economic and health hardships. For example, in
the beginning of 2004, 43% of infants aged 6-24 months in Zohra
suffered from malnutrition. The USAID-funded Communication for
Healthy Living (CHL) Project, a cross-cutting, national public
health communication project designed to improve the health of
Egyptian families, seeks to deliver the message that with the
right information, all people can make better choices and
improve their health and their lives. In CHL’s community
programs, the CDA takes a lead role in implementing health
interventions that ultimately mobilize men and women from the
community to assume leadership. After just one year of program
activities, the malnutrition rate in Zohra has dropped to 6%.
Tammem was trained in the “Arab Women Speak Out” (AWSO) program
in 2004 implemented as part of CHL’s community-level activities.
The AWSO program uses the tools of informal education to empower
women throughout the Near East by providing role models of
achievement and self-esteem for women and encouraging acceptance
of these roles by men and women, opinion leaders, religious
groups, policy makers, and national organizations. AWSO was
developed by the Johns Hopkins University/Center for
Communication Programs (JHU/CCP) in collaboration with The
Center of Arab Women for Training and Research and supported by
USAID. It is designed to be integrated into ongoing
community-based programs with NGOs and governmental or
international agencies, and has been implemented in seven
countries since it was introduced in 1999.
Dalal, a 29-year old mother of 3, participated in one of
Tammem’s first AWSO Trainings last year. Women from the
community learned how integrate the empowering health messages
and information included in CHL’s national public health
campaign into the AWSO model. “I noticed Dalal’s intelligence
right away. She easily took on the role of leader in the class,”
Tammem commented. After completing the training, Dalal became a
community volunteer, holding AWSO discussion groups in homes to
spread the message of empowerment and health to other women.
At first, the people of Zohra were a bit suspicious of AWSO.
“The curriculum deals with sensitive issues, and we weren’t sure
it would be acceptable to the people,” explained Mr. Tareq
Mohammed Mokhtar, the director of Zohra’s Community Development
Association. But once they heard from the women who completed
the first trainings, more and more women wanted to participate.
“Since then, we have seen a great impact, almost right away,
particularly with pregnant women accessing their right to
ante-natal care,” he said.
In groups across the country like the ones being held in
Tammem’s home, women are gaining experience tackling sensitive
subjects like female genital cutting, early marriage, and family
planning as well as learning the danger signs of pregnancy and
delivery and how to prepare nutritious meals on a budget. By
focusing on health aspects, the women gather knowledge,
confidence, and communication skills that they can transfer into
their social and personal arenas.
“A woman has to have a voice in who she marries. There has to be
feelings between a husband and a wife for the marriage to work,”
says Yasmine, an unmarried 18-year old woman in the group. At
first, her family was reluctant to let her participate in the
group. “They heard we were going to be talking about
reproduction. But Tammem met with them and explained how
important it was for me to learn about these things so that I
would be able to take care of my health better,” she said.
Another woman in the group faced similar resistance from her
family. “My mother-in-law used to forbid me to leave the house
by myself. She wouldn’t even let me speak about joining AWSO,
and it was not done to contradict her, ever!” Tammem again
intervened, and was able to convince the mother-in-law that AWSO
would be a good influence on her daughter-in-law and family as a
whole. “We talk more now, and I share with her what I am
learning,” said the woman.
The women are full of examples about how life will be for their
daughters compared to their lives because of AWSO. “I have five
brothers and five sisters. I married when I was 15 years old.
But my husband and I have made a conscious decision to space our
children at least 3 years apart, and not to have too many,”
commented Dalal.
“My children will be able to talk to me. We have a bridge of
communication so that they can get correct information from me,
not the streets,” said another woman.
“In the past, only boys were educated, but our daughters will
all go to school,” said Umm el Hamada
(mother of Hamada), the group matriarch at age 34, and mother of
5 children.
The women are eager build on what they are learning in AWSO as
well as to spread their knowledge to their neighbors, family and
friends. Most of the women express a keen interest in finding
ways to contribute more to the economy of the household, such as
by starting small projects like raising poultry.
“It’s cheaper
to raise and eat birds than to buy meat,” they explain. Several
of the women have also learned from others in the group how to
get a micro-loan from the bank to set up their own small
businesses. They are also seeking ways to get more involved in
the community and are raising the issue of setting up a literacy
program for other women.
“What we are learning in AWSO is not the same as learning from
TV or the radio. We get real information here, from real people
who talk about their own lives, and we answer each other’s
questions,” summed up Dalal.
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