BY JOSEPH SOBOKA
For parents, the issue of children is placed on top of the list of priorities in life. In African context, marriage, primarily targets the production of children as many as possible. Traditionally, aged spouses, especially the mother, without children, are considered as cursed and are looked down upon by the members of the community; the father is never blamed for the crisis though. In patriarchal society everything negative pertaining to reproduction is heaped on the poor mother who cannot defend herself. In Ethiopian context, the mother is referred to as a mule that cannot bear a child. The extension of generation has endowed the husband and the wife with high social standard and prestige of security even for their physical safety. A family with many children especially, male children, cannot be intimidated by blackmailing of any sort. The father has strong public standing akin to his children’s, mainly physical power, to dictate and subdue any threatening situation that he encounters. The people in the neighborhood of such family often submit to the circumstance if they wish to lead a peaceful life. Since they cannot win them, they are forced to yield to the will of the stronger family. The maxim, ’If you can’t win them, join them’ become more real in this context. Therefore, whatever the stronger party decides, regardless of the invalidity of the issue, still rules unquestionably. With such social acceptance, even though the means applied is entirely wrong, they do not refrain from obtaining things they want from others. Rather than obeying the law, they try to become the law themselves. So they follow the philosophy ‘the end justifies the means’. Although, the benefit that the family generates because of its children, the father should know better to respect the rights of others as long as it is the part of the society for mutual benefits of coexistence.
In the process of their growth, African children are left to their own device.
Considering the traditional Ethiopian context, there is a philosophy that children are looked after by or left to their destiny- a power that controls events in the life of the child while growing up. Unlike the modern age, when it comes to food, children are fed after their parents finished eating. If parents keep eating for a long time, the children hungrily keep waiting. The churning of children’s stomach, their yawning and restlessness is little noticed by the parents.
When it comes to playing, the children do not have the type of facility the children of some enlightened parents can enjoy; no toys are provided by parents. Using appropriate technology, the children make their own toys of some sort. Children, while small, help their parents in herding sheep and running errands and in household chores. After becoming adults, they care for their aged parents. How harsh they treated their children, the parents expect their children to unreservedly support them doing their old age and in most cases the children are expected to comply, whatsoever. The Christian value, honor thy father and mother, should be obeyed by the children unreservedly. In its honest essence, honor thy father and mother means you have to support them despite their ill treatment of the children by and beating them and abandoning both the children and their mother. The father, no matter what is still their creator next to God; without him, the children would not have come into existence.
The birth of a child is not a planned phenomenon in traditional Africa. It is not that the parents mutually decide to have a child and neither the child is consulted about it; he finds himself on the lap of his mother sucking her breast. The child, the result of the parents’ sensual pleasure, happens to exist and entirely dependent on them, for his upbringing. There is nobody else to care for him; he is at their mercy. He is vulnerable to anything that risks his life while growing up. The condition of the child’s mental, physical, emotional and social developments is in the hands of the so called parents. Traditional African, even in some cases now, parents had a single dream that the children gets education and a job in government offices because they had to care for their aged parents. The concern of child’s future life was little considered; it was what the child can do in favor of the parents; particularly the father was who should be the focus on. About a decade ago, a certain individual living in eastern Ethiopia told the writer that parents want to produce about thirty children – ten of them die due to manmade or natural causes, another ten somehow get job in the country and support the parents, the remaining ten go abroad and remit money back home. The child-parents relation is economy-focused one.
Much of the responsibility of raring the children is always shouldered by the mother in addition to building a house, working in fields with the husband and accomplishing household chores. From dawn to dusk she was engaged in household duties with no one to assist her. What a disgusting and revolting experience! The husband, for that matter kept aloof when it comes to being involved in the household activities such as working in the kitchen, looking after children and the like. Despite the sacrifices she pays, in traditional Africa, women would inherit nothing from her husband. She can be divorced without any settlement; such extreme measure differs from culture to culture. Every cent she earns goes to the family while that of the husbands is spent on whatever he pleases. A woman is viewed as nothing other than baby machine. Because of this children are often seen drawing to their mother, even if some problem occurs between their parents, they tend to side their mother. The irony of the situation is that, the father in spite of his being indifferent about the wellbeing of his children, he still demands every good treatment from them during old age. The child brought up in mud-walled, straw-roofed home is expected to build a mansion for his parents after getting a job. Running up and down to school on a paved high way, bouncing along a ratted dirt road is still expected to construct tarmac road leading to his parents’ residence. No consideration of the child’s private life, marrying and producing his own children is often over looked. The society at large, believes that a woman incapable of producing a child is not worth keeping as a wife. Male chauvinism, the subversive idea, pervades the family life of some traditional Africans. The man is the maker and breaker of things concerning the family affairs no matter how it may cause misery to the members of the family. Women suffer most and suffer quietly; after marriage she belongs to her husband. The husband treats her any way he chooses. Like that of some societies hugging and kissing are not even thought of, only copulation is what is observed with the traditional husband. The phrase ‘I love you’ is under no circumstance is uttered by such husbands. He comes home every evening often drunk and expects her to wash his feet. Moreover, he demands good food for which he has not given her money. If the food is not to his taste, he slaps irrationally. A certain Kenyan lady once told the writer, at times the husband would come home with a woman in the evening; he would call his wife to meet her new friend and calls the children to meet their new mother. Thereafter, the woman lives under the same roof with the legitimate wife and becomes the second wife. Because of the unruly husband, corruption grows to scandalous proportion in the family. The children, they are as weak as their mother; they cannot stop the harm their father inflicts on their mother. They only shed bitter tears as the husband beats and mistreats their mother; yet, such situation leaves irremovable scars in their mind that they remember the whole of their life.
Comparably, modern or educated African husbands are doing their best to care and love their wives and children. They try their best not to be occupied by ulterior motives related to the interest of their family. What a great behavioral transformation education has brought into the life of genuine couples! Let us all stick to the latter life style by exercising temperance any form.
The Ethiopian Herald 18 April 2021
