Contributor: John Cunningham

Even in Bangui, the capital city of the Central African Republic, the power supply is unstable, water is scarce and there are few paved streets. Life is challenging for the five million people who live in this country.

Martine Otto leads the Association of Widows and Orphans in Bangui. They provide legal advice and skills training to widows and abused women. Photo: John Cunningham/Mercy Corps

But more than many other places in the world, it's women who face a particular challenge here: oppression and abuse at the hands of their own men.

The country's rigid gender roles leave women with no education, no income and no decision-making power within the home — even as they carry all the responsibility for domestic work and child-rearing. Women are held up to impossible standards in service of their husbands. This extreme power imbalance creates a breeding ground for physical, sexual and mental abuse.

At the same time, the country has traditionally done little to address and prevent gender-based violence. If a woman is brave enough to report her abuse and leave, she has few resources for recovery — and even fewer options to make a living without a man's financial support. This is about as tough as life gets.

But Mercy Corps is doing two things to help these women: First, we partner with the Association des Femmes Juristes de Centrafrique (AFJC) to support abused women and widows and help them navigate the complicated legal system in CAR. Second, we provide them training and investment to open their own small businesses and earn their own living, ending their dependence on men to build a better life.

Refuge in harsh circumstances

During my visit to the Central African Republic I spent time at one of the four counseling centers that Mercy Corps helped establish with AFJC. CAR is one of the poorest countries in the world; it is landlocked, with weak infrastructure and surrounded by unstable neighbors. The people here have endured a legacy of armed conflict, poor governance and corruption.

These centers, opened in Bangui, Bouar, Bambari and Bangassou in 2010, are some of the only places where women can find refuge — and strength — in the face of terrible hardship. Here they can receive legal assistance, psychological support, medical referrals and emergency food, hygiene supplies and shelter as needed.

Women in CAR are entitled to inherit the possessions and wealth of her husband if he dies. Seragaza Alima stood up for those rights. Photo: John Cunningham/Mercy Corps

Sometimes women may not be physically abused, but being kept in the dark about their legal rights leaves them victimized all the same. I met Seragaza Alima at the center after her husband died. His family had taken everything she had and left her destitute. Once she learned that every woman in the CAR is entitled to inherit the possessions and wealth of her husband if he dies, Seragaza was empowered to take her case to a tribunal. They found in her favor — a great victory.

Pursuit of justice

Though Seragaza is still struggling to get the family to return her possessions, her ruling is progress. As women win more cases, the message will get through that widowed and abandoned women have rights within the law — and that the law will back them.

The legal counselors at our centers also offer mediation services for women who are worried about being shunned by their communities or losing their main source of support. The process — used most frequently in cases of abandonment and child support, when there is not a life-threatening risk of violence — educates both parties on on CAR laws and encourages behavior changes toward more equality.

Survivors of abuse, on the other hand, are provided a safe place to escape the danger, and our staff helps them navigate the complicated court system in pursuit of justice.

Spreading a sense of wellbeing

Later, I also met a group of women who, with training and support from Mercy Corps, had set up their own sewing business. Like Seragaza, they had lost everything, but now have many individual customers for the clothes they make and have just landed a contract to provide outfits for an entire local school.

Recognizing that income can equal independence, the centers also help women learn the skills and get the supplies to start businesses like sewing, making soap, and selling cakes and palm oil. These ventures require only a small amount of capital, but quickly provide women with their own money, allowing them to put their new knowledge into practice and protect their rights.

As the program also educates local authorities and health personnel about issues of gender-based violence and how to help victims, these women are increasingly not alone. Things are changing here. Slowly, but they are changing.

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People of Serangoto. Photo: John Cunningham/Mercy Corps

Manioc is the basic staple diet in much of the Central African Republic, and there’s often little else. It’s dull and bland with little nutritional value, but many people here eat nothing at breakfast, nothing at lunch and one meal of manioc late afternoon. That’s it. Occasionally a little manioc leaf or peanut and oil sauce to go with it, but even then the manioc does little except fill you up, and over time can lead to malnutrition and a weakened immune system.

To tackle the problems created by relying on manioc alone, and to help local people access more nutritious food, Mercy Corps has set up communal vegetable gardens across the country. In the village of Serangoto, I met some of 90 families involved in their local garden scheme.

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Our team helped Helene fight the illegal arrest of her husband. Photo: John Cunningham/Mercy Corps

Helene Ngomet’s husband had been out walking one evening on the street of Bangassou, the small town in the Central African Republic where they lived. The local police stopped him and took him from the street. They accused him of being a stranger in town who was up to no good, despite his protestations to the contrary, and put him in jail.

For Helene, it was as if her husband had simply disappeared. He had no way to communicate with her - you can imagine how she felt. When Helene eventually discovered what had happened, she used the support she had got from Mercy Corps and what she had learnt from our team about human rights and the law to challenge the police. Assisted by members of the community group set up by Mercy Corps and our team facilitator, she insisted her husband could not be arrested without evidence of wrongdoing – that in fact he had been illegally arrested. She was also able to prove her husband was indeed a local man.

Helene’s husband was released without charge and with no further consequences. So life returned to normal. Things could have been very different indeed for Helene, her children and her husband if our human rights information and education programme had not been running. Real programme, real experience, real result – normal life maintained for an ordinary family. This was Mercy Corps making a difference. This was Helene being the change.

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Gertrude and Marie Claude. Photo: John Cunningham/Mercy Corps

In Bambari, 200 kilometers through rainforest tracks from the capital of the Central African Republic, I met Gertrude Mandaia and Marie Claude Gbaida. Until recently, they had earned a living carrying out female circumcision on girls across their community.

Gertrude and Marie Claude told me that they had felt pressured by tradition to circumcise local girls but with Mercy Corps’ help had stopped, and persuaded more than 20 others to stop too.

I asked where the circumcisions were done and how and they told me of the traditional open air procedure, using razor blades, special knives and no pain killers of any kind. They could earn between £5 and £10 for each girl they circumcised.

But Gertrude and Marie Claude told me they had been scared, and that they had wanted to stop. They had heard of young girls dying during the procedure or soon after, and of other ‘nurses’ who had been prosecuted and jailed for being involved. So when, a few months ago, Gertrude and Marie Claude heard about Mercy Corps’ work on women’s rights and empowerment on the radio, they got in touch. With our teams help they have formed an association with others who have stopped the traditional practice and are discussing how they can find alternative ways to earn income. They want to start trading in some way, so over the next month Mercy Corps will give them training in good business practice and administration to help them get started – from how to keep basic accounts and manage money to presenting a selling pitch at the market.

I felt privileged to see the work of our team in the Central African Republic first hand, saving girls from the dangers of female circumcision and helping women like Gertrude and Marie Claude make a new start.

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