The Sunday Mail
Disability Issues with Dr Peta
This article seeks to draw on the direct voice of some women with disabilities, to illuminate some of their love and marriage experiences, as reported during a broad study that was carried out in Harare, Zimbabwe (Peta 2016). There is strong evidence that some men who engage disabled women in intimate relationships are reluctant to fulfil the significant
traditional practice of paying lobola (the bride price) for them. From the perspective of some disabled women, such reluctance stems from the fact that some men regard disabled women as “damaged goods” who are unbefitting to be spouses but only useful in being ‘consumed’ by men in coitus.
For example, Tsitsi who is physically disabled says, “Farai told me that I am beautiful and he loved me, but I was not sure whether to love him or not, and then I started to love him, because I was thinking that he loves me for sure. Then he raped me and I got pregnant…and he said ‘handingakuroore nekuti uri chirema chemukadzi’ (I can’t marry you because you are a disabled woman).”
Mako, who is epileptic says, “I met him last year and he impregnated me and I gave birth to a son and he ran away from me. He said I can’t waste my money paying lobola for a woman who has epilepsy and yet there are ‘normal’ women out there that I can marry.”
Danai, who has albinism, is unhappy that the father of her two children has not yet paid lobola for her.
“This man impregnated me twice and I gave birth to two children, but he doesn’t want to pay lobola for me because I have albinism. Although my children are ‘normal’, he refused to introduce me and my children to his mother. He said he doesn’t want his family to know that he has fathered children with a woman who has albinism.”
In another example, Tamara, who is blind says, “I have a son who is six years old but his father has not married me. He said that I am just a blind woman who is not worth paying lobola for.”
Local literature reveals that lobola is significant in Zimbabwean customs (Chigwedere, 1982; Chireshe & Chireshe, 2010), albeit the fact that with “modernity”, some men are now trivialising the practice.
Lobola brings the family of the bride and that of the bridegroom together at a traditional ceremony which symbolises gratitude to the bride’s family for birthing and raising their daughter, who by virtue of the traditional marriage, is expected to broaden her husband’s family by birthing children.
There is a general belief among people in Zimbabwe that men who by-pass the fundamental African custom of paying lobola are practising manenji (a bizarre act), which will ultimately bring misfortune upon their own lives and that of their offspring.
However, recent research findings (Peta 2016) indicate that disability makes a difference because some men who engage in intimate relations with disabled women and have fathered or are yet to father some children with the women tend to ignore the traditional practice of paying lobola on the grounds that the women involved in the union are disabled.
Disability is fore-grounded to frame the experiences of a disabled woman, in a context where she is perceived as being unworthy of the honour of having lobola paid for her because she is disabled.
Engaging in intimate relations with a woman for whom a man has not paid lobola for means that the man regards such a woman as one of a lesser value and therefore “…one of whiling up time with, a kind of toy” (Chireshe & Chireshe, 2010).
However, one can argue that by not having lobola paid for them, some disabled women are then able to avoid the control of men which relegates those for whom lobola is paid for, to a subordinate position where their voice may be silenced and their capability to claim their agency may also be castrated.
However, research findings point to the prevalence of male domination in a context where disabled women are relegated to a subordinate position to men, regardless of whether lobola has been paid for them or not (Peta 2016).
For example, Tari, who has albinism says, “He says he loves me, but he bullies me around but he didn’t even pay lobola for me, he beats me up if I upset him in any way.”
From another perspective, lobola is used as an excuse to offer a new wife to a man whose wife acquires disability in the course of a marriage.
Chipo had a spinal cord injury that induced physical impairment, she says, “When I became disabled, my father came from the village to see me, but then he brought with him my younger sister, whom he offered to my husband as a second wife.
“My father said that my husband had paid lobola for me in full when I was not disabled so it would be unfair for him to live with a disabled wife, because his conjugal rights will be disturbed. “My husband was very excited about the arrangement, but I was very hurt. These men, whether it’s your father or your husband, they are all the same, they just think about their own conjugal rights and not those of women.”
There is evidence that the disability of a woman is commonly fore-grounded to relegate her to a “sub-standard” status at the express exclusion of all her other attributes such as her intelligence. Whilst local literature states that the payment of lobola is regarded as some form of social stabiliser (Chireshe & Chireshe, 2010), recent research (Peta 2016) reveals that disability disrupts such stability, in a scenario where disability intersects with gender and culture to undermine the marital experiences of a woman who acquires disability during the course of her marriage.
Men are urged to refrain from regarding disabled women as good for nothing human beings in public and pursuing them behind the scenes for coitus, thereby impregnating them and dumping them afterwards.
Disability does not mean that a woman loses her femininity, she retains all her social life attributes such as both her inner and outside beauty, her intelligence or her kindness, among others.
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