Beautiful. Thanx Coach for sharing Dr. Sigga Jagne. I have the most affinity for these two questions as they relate directly to GDP and greater development. Excellent.
Haruna.
But that is something missing in this country. Some people are even suggesting a mass re-education of Gambians?
That’s right, this is missing. Because if you notice in the neighbouring Senegal for example, people are highly educated about most things – whether in politics, culture, or many others – it is because they are literate in their native languages… It is not like they are studying things in French. And it is the same in Asia, you will even realise that there are more women in leadership positions in Asia than any other region. And that’s because of the same things. Asians have been using their local languages to educate their own people, rather than English or French.
Do you think such is possible in The Gambia?
As a teacher of languages, I think it’s always good to start work in your native languages before you move to somebody else’s language. What you find is, a lot of people despite their level of education in foreign languages, cannot even write in their native languages. English is a second language or for some Gambians, even a fifth language because they are speaking other languages before they go to school to learn English. Imagine, trying to do everything in that English language? Five times, two times removed from your native language? We have a lot of this adult literacy in the past, but I think we need to go beyond that and teach about civic education, cultural studies… all for the women.
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Interesting read from http://gambiabeat.weebly.com
Dr. Siga Fatima-Jagne
Academic/International Consultant
Development activist, international consultant, and Director of International Development Support Services (IDSS), Dr. Siga Fatima Jagne-Jallow worked as Assistant Professor, English, Comparative Literature, Women's Studies, and African Diaspora Studies, Spelman College, Atlanta, GA, between 1992 and 1996; as Teaching Assistant, Department of Comparative Literature/African and African-American Studies/Romance Languages; and Director, Graduate Travel and Research Fund and Vice President, Graduate students Organisation at SUNY-Binghamton University, New York.
She was also Professor/Acting Chairperson and Vice Chairperson of the University Council, Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Canada (University Extension Programme in The Gambia). Dr. Jagne speaks, reads and write English, French and Arabic, and gathered a wide range of experience working in many African countries as a researcher and international consultant. In this interview with Sanna Camara, she speaks on politics, women, education and some of her personal stories.
Some people believe that successful women like yourself find it difficult to marry. Do you have similar experience?
No, I have never had that experience. I was the one running from men… (Laughs). I have to be honest, I heard it a lot but I never had the problem. I am the one who didn’t want to get married. I wanted to have a career and I focused on that. When I was ready, I got married. But for men getting scared due to somethings, may be there were but some came. So I can’t speak for all men on that. I got married after my Ph.D and after working for many years – about 12 years ago, but it was basically my personal choice. And I am happy now; I see my children as my priority… I could have married and have them as my priority at age 20. But I decided otherwise and I think I am a better mother now… having children at this time of my life, and I have no regrets. There is nothing more important to me now than my husband and my kids. They are my priority.
The national assembly recently passed the women’s bill into law, but with reservations on some issues. As former director of the Women’s Bureau, did you play any role in this Bill?
Then, I used to work at the Pro-PAG and we worked closely with the women’s bureau to have a draft of the women’s bill. That was where my role ended. I think the areas the legislators had reservations on were affirmative action part. Where there had to be a certain number of females in the parliament and in certain institutions. I think the worry was that, if they have, say 33 percent of women parliamentarians, are they going to have the right people from the population to put in parliament? Isn’t that a lot at this time, knowing the level of awareness, education of women… and I always stress, education is not about going to school but knowing issues.
So do you think that it is time that women have a proportional representation in the national assembly?
I think in certain areas, affirmative action is important. I also that think in politics, it has to be a personal decision. What if they give women the 33 percent and not enough women are interested? It’s not going to make difference in our lives. For The Gambian women, from the research I have done, many of them want to be more economically independent than to be part of politics. I find that very interesting because when you ask them most often, what they tell you is they want economic independence. ‘Do you want to go into politics?’ they would say ‘no’ they want money so that they can do better in life, and they don’t think it can happen for them to go into politics. It’s a cultural norm that women should remain in the private spheres while men remain in the public spheres.
For the affirmative action, many think it should not be confined to the national assembly but also the political parties…?
Yes, because that is where decisions are made as to who can be a candidate to go into the national assembly. That decision is not made at the level of the national assembly. I think these political parties should be challenged to practise affirmative action.
Other people find the demand for monogamy rather contentious too?
I think polygamy started because people were farming and needed a lot of help on their farms. Now, I don’t understand why people in the urban areas would practise polygamy. It is true, oh yes. Historically, even white communities, European nations and Asia, they all practised polygamy. That was the cultural start of polygamy and if you do anthropology, you learn this. That’s how polygamy started because everybody was agrarian, everybody was farming and you needed a lot of hands on the farm because there was no technology. Men married a lot of women and had a lot of children to work on the farm….
But others would consider it religious. For example, Islam allows men to marry up to four wives…
No, no, no… then it is people who don’t read the Qur’an and the Hadith very well who would say that, because the conditions for marrying more than one wife are so difficult to fulfill. Do you see people from Saudi Arabia marrying more than one wife? You hardly see Arabs marrying two wives because the conditions that are set are so difficult. I think very few in The Gambia would qualify to marry more than one wife. First, most women feed themselves. Most men cannot fulfill the main condition that Islam asks from them, which is to cloth and feed their wives and children. So why would they marry a second wife when they can’t even take care of the first one they have? That’s against Islam.
Some argue that marrying more than one wife can help in reducing the unmarried women on the streets. Particularly if the statistics are saying that women are more than men nine times?
Actually, if I remember right, once I came to do a research as a student, we have more male babies being born in The Gambia than females. That figure is not true; the female population has always been 50 or 51 percent. It has never been above 51. The reason why we have more females at adulthood than males is because more males die under five years old. For some reasons, girls are stronger and survive longer than their counterpart males. These are scientific facts. I don’t know if the records are available here but in most countries, records of births should be able to prove this.
If your husband wants to marry a second wife, how would you handle that?
I don’t like to discuss polygamy because it is a personal choice. I know some women who wanted their husbands to marry, and even get them, second wives. And there are those who don’t want it. Such are private things… I know in certain countries there are laws, like Senegal, that when you marry you sign papers on whether your husband would marry a second wife or not. Some women sign to allow it…
But you don’t belong to that category? Or do you have an agreement with your husband too?
Me? I don’t have any agreement… and my husband is also his own individual and I think, like I said, it’s a personal choice for both sides. People can do what they want… how you react, nobody can predict.
What jobs have you been doing?
I have been doing holiday jobs at ports authority in Banjul from the mid-70s to 78. After that, I worked for The Gambia Information Services as a journalist and editor after my sixth form. I also went to the US to study, but while I was studying, I was tutoring in French and women studies. For my Masters, I was actually teaching a comparative politics class. For my PhD, I was also teaching full time in the areas of comparative literature, women studies and African studies.
But how did you get into gender?
Gender is something I grew up with. I think I grew up in a household where there is gender equality… and I couldn’t understand why other households did not have that just like my household. So it’s an innate part of me so that whatever work, or analysis I do, I bring in gender. It is an interest of mine but my disciplines are in the art, the humanities and the social sciences. I have done a lot of work in policy, research more than I have done on gender.
You were once appointed to head the women’s bureau. How did that job come about?
You were once appointed to head the women’s bureau. How did that job come about?
Actually, I was on a sabbatical from… I was teaching in the US and I had just come back and I was in Senegal and teaching at the Codesria gender institute. I happen to come to The Gambia and was chosen as one of the co-lead consultants for the first national women’s policy in 1996/7. A few of my friends and colleagues who are not by the way Gambian, actually convinced me to take the job that was being advertised at the time since I was planning on leaving the academia. So I applied, got interviewed and was given the job of the executive director of the women’s bureau.
Women constitute the majority of this country, but they are still playing secondary roles when it comes to decision making positions in the country?
I think it has to do with cultural issues and the lack of acceptance by males and even females themselves that they need to be in leadership positions. For instance, when we talk of the highest level, we have women represented. Where the problem comes in is actually at the decentralised levels: when you look at the number of chiefs, alkalolu, and even governors. We are yet to have females in most of these positions. Of course, the only position where we have the women occupying is in the village heads (Alkalo). But other than that, I am yet to…. Historically, maybe I need to find out because I am doing research on that right now. I think it is very important for us to have females in such positions at the decentralised levels. Another reason why females are not in positions where they are supposed to be is the level of education. We are not talking about acquiring degrees, but basic education in your local language. You have to have basic education or a basic way of knowing processes and how things are done…
But that is something missing in this country. Some people are even suggesting a mass re-education of Gambians?
That’s right, this is missing. Because if you notice in the neighbouring Senegal for example, people are highly educated about most things – whether in politics, culture, or many others – it is because they are literate in their native languages… It is not like they are studying things in French. And it is the same in Asia, you will even realise that there are more women in leadership positions in Asia than any other region. And that’s because of the same things. Asians have been using their local languages to educate their own people, rather than English or French.
Do you think such is possible in The Gambia?
As a teacher of languages, I think it’s always good to start work in your native languages before you move to somebody else’s language. What you find is, a lot of people despite their level of education in foreign languages, cannot even write in their native languages. English is a second language or for some Gambians, even a fifth language because they are speaking other languages before they go to school to learn English. Imagine, trying to do everything in that English language? Five times, two times removed from your native language? We have a lot of this adult literacy in the past, but I think we need to go beyond that and teach about civic education, cultural studies… all for the women.
The national assembly recently passed the women’s bill into law, but with reservations on some issues.
Then, I used to work at the Pro-PAG and we worked closely with the women’s bureau to have a draft of the women’s bill. That was where my role ended. I think the areas the legislators had reservations on were affirmative action part. Where there had to be a certain number of females in the parliament and in certain institutions. I think the worry was that, if they have, say 33 percent of women parliamentarians, are they going to have the right people from the population to put in parliament? Isn’t that a lot at this time, knowing the level of awareness, education of women… and I always stress, education is not about going to school but knowing issues.
Thank you for your time, Dr. Jagne-Jallow.
Thaank you Sanna.
"True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice." Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
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