Wangari Maathai is Unbowed

I recently read Wangari Maathai’s autobiography Unbowed in preparation for AWDF’s first book club meeting which will be held this Friday and my immediate reaction is Wow! The story of Wangari is truly an inspirational one. Wangari makes me want to go out, challenge the politicians about corruption and get thrown in jail for my efforts. Okay, not quite like that but that is what she did time and time again in her promotion of green belts across Kenya and other parts of the world. The key message for me in Wangari’s autobiography is that individuals can make a difference. I just visited the Green Belt Movement’s website and Green Belt Movement Kenya has participated in planting more than 30 million trees! Now that’s a legacy that anyone would be proud to leave behind.

In my opinion there are many lessons that young women can take from Wangari’s autobiography. (When I talk of young women I generally mean women aged 20 – 30) I am hoping that if women critically consider some of these issues at an early age it will prevent unnecessary heartache, pain and regrets in the future.

When Wangari got married her husband’s family expected her to take her husband’s name. Although she was initially against the idea, she capitulated. In her own words:

‘The practice of using the title ‘Mrs.’ after marriage, followed by the husband’s surname, was introduced by the British and I didn’t see why I had to adopt it. True that is what everybody else in the emerging elite class did, and not doing it seemed to suggest that I did not quite love Mwangi and his family. Largely to demonstrate that this was not the case, I agreed, but put a hyphen between the two surnames. Eventually I stopped using the hyphen and even dropped my maiden name for day-to-day correspondence.’

Can you imagine that after changing her name for her husband, joining him on the campaign trail in order to fulfil his political ambitions and performing all those other duties that ‘good African’ women perform for their husbands he has the nerve to ask her to change his name when they get divorced. Now, I don’t even want to get started on the divorce…he petitioned for divorce (I suggest you read Unbowed for the whole story). I could really identify with Wangari not wanting to change her name when she got married. I had faced the same pressure to change my name when I got married (I’m no longer married by the way) but I refused to change my name. My Dad when he used to ring me would call me Mrs x, I think he just did that to annoy me, and I would have to say ‘Daddy please don’t call me Mrs x’. Well reading Unbowed reminded me of that time in my life. I thought to myself that ‘Thank goodness, I did not change my name when I got married, I would have had to un change it or even worse stick with the name of a man I am no longer married to’. Actually before I got married I did think of all those things. ‘What if I get married 5 times? I will have to change my name 5 different times’. You are probably now thinking my marriage was doomed to failure…So for me the issue of taking your husband’s name if you get married is a serious one. What’s my advice? Well, I’m sure you can guess…One of the things which really impressed me about Maathai was how she bounced back from any setback which befell her. One of her favourite quotes appears to be ‘In every cloud there is a silver lining’ so when she received a letter from her husband’s lawyers asking her to change her name she did…she changed her name from Mathai to Maathai.

The other critical issue that for me is highlighted in Unbowed is ensuring that your name is on the legal documentation for any property or any other investment you may secure in partnership with your husband, or anyone else for that matter. Wangari and her husband bought property together however the property was in his name which meant that post divorce she could not claim any right to in. I think it is easy to think these issues do not matter when you are in love and all is well in your relationships but who knows what the future holds?

All in all Unbowed for me has been a fantastic read and Wangari Maathai now joins my list of female heroines and inspirational role models.

Nana Sekyiamah
Programme Officer
Fundraising & Communications