In accordance to 2018-2019 reports on gender equality, Rwanda positions in 10 best countries of gender equality in world and subsequently known as a country which advances women empowerment and advocate for their rights with great commitment in all aspect, either business, politics, etc. Women’s rights are the moral or legal entitlements that allow women to do they are able to and get things that they deserve and thus develop. Despite the awesome progress made by Rwandan government in perceiving women’s potential and escalating their rights especially through gender equality concept, there are still some constraints to overcome. Poverty and limited skills and capacities among Rwandan women are most noteworthy challenges observed to women’s rights implementation. In the following paragraphs I am going to discuss current challenges to women’s right in Rwanda.
Firstly, there is limited self-esteem and limited skills and capacities among some Rwandan women to either speak up for themselves or take risk to induce a certain beneficial thing to get to appreciable success. This is because of limited self-esteem among women through which they undermine their ability due to minor perspectives such as fear. This comes to be one of reasons why there are some women who face gender based violence and other mistreatments but still the reportings stay lower compared to the rate of sexual based attacks.
Furthermore, some women have insufficient skills and capabilities to take some technical jobs that give the best salary. Consequently, this prevents them from earning that enormous money and choose to get low paying jobs instead of staying jobless winning nothing but kept under their family’s threats. Research shows that boys and men dominate in well-paying jobs such as carpentry, construction and motor mechanics while girls enrol in soft employments like tailoring and hairdressing.
127 our experts are availableright now
Additionally, environmental protection and land management is dominated to men. As proved by agricultural sector in Rwanda, men are involved in land management and environment especially in family affairs at 24% against 14% of women’s participation . Yet in accordance to women’s right and gender uniformity, women and men are supposed to participate in land management equally. Such unequal contribution is a very big issue which can boost inequalities and misunderstanding between men and women.
Furthermore, Poor understanding of gender equality concept is one of the challenges that nowadays feminists are struggling to overcome. It is basically so disappointing to find that some Rwandans, even women inclusive, still don’t get the real meaning of Gender and confuse it with women taking over men. Such people tend to fight back when women start to speak up for their own rights.. A great example is the increasing number of women in Rwandan parliament which was appreciated by many people, however, there was a negative feedback got that women should not intervene in parliamentary issues. According to Rwanda Investigation Bureau, most conflicts in Rwanda societies are gender based issues. This demonstrates that people are not yet fully grasped by Gender equality concept.
Besides, it is statically proven that men dominates women in labour force participations, employment and entrepreneurship. Considering the managerial positions, 34.1per cent for females and 65.9 percent for males. There are only 33.5 percent females who are chief executive, senior officers and legislators and only 34.5 percent who are administrative and commercial managers.The current Labour Force Survey (LFS) shows that the overall labour force participation stands at 52.9 percent with men’s involvement at 62.5% against 44.4% for women.
Furthermore, society stereotypes and religion is another provocation against women’s rights in Rwanda. Some women aren’t able to reach to the noteworthy potential due to their religious beliefs and the expectations from their society. The index attributes the difference to the fact that high positions are stereotypically considered by society to be more appropriate for males. This is proved to stop some women with such impediments to have dreams with expensive taste.
In addition, the other great challenge to women’s right that most people are getting worried about is poverty. Nowadays the rate of early pregnancy and abortion is increasing in Rwanda. Destitution is claimed to be one of causes to this which makes it a great threat to women’s right in Rwanda. Mostly in rural areas, research shows that young girls who are in such poor conditions are likely to get deceived by men who are even older than them whereby those men promise to give them what they can not afford especially leisure facilities.
Gashora community -Bugesera district- is one of the cases of such areas. Most of the times these men end up ruining young girl’s life by abusing them either sexually or mentally.
Moreover, cultural beliefs and cultural practices are the most common excuses claimed by many women’s right abusers. In some Rwandan rural areas, some cultural practices in forbid women to induce the services that they deserve. Research shows that there are some people especially in rural areas who believe that according to culture women are supposed to take care of domestic affairs and children and let men do business affairs and decide what must be done without the consent of spouses. This contradicts to most of the women’s right, for example right to contribute to national economic development.
To bolt the keys of my entryways, there are numerous challenges to women’s rights in Rwanda particularly in rustic areas, this may prevent ladies from reaching to their most elevated potential. As Rwandans it’s up to us to battle against challenges against and work together thus develop our nation. It’s time for Rwandans to believe in women power because they are able as women’s current achievements demonstrate it. As long as Rwandans enhance ‘Gender Equality’, Rwanda will be more developed and human rights based country ever.
