By Heidi K. Brenner Hayatgheyb

“In Kenya, we are either infected or affected by the disease of AIDS,” writes Kenyan community activist Margaret Ikiara to Amistad.

Elementary teacher Alice Ouma is someone who was affected by AIDS, and could not simply sit back and watch as the women of her tribe struggled to cope with the devastating impact of AIDS.

In 2001, with an unlimited spirit of compassion and determination to help women who had been widowed by AIDS, Alice, along with her husband, Elder James Ouma, began the Nyalgunga Widows and Orphans Development and Educational Project (NYALWODEP). The project is located in the village of Nyalgunga in the Siaya district of western Kenya, an area primarily inhabited by the Luo tribe. Due
to the tribe’s deeply rooted customs and cultural practices, such as their “wife-inheritance” tradition, the spread of HIV/AIDS has significantly increased, and widows and orphans lead extremely difficult lives.

“When a man dies, the wife cannot go to another home and be welcomed before she is “inherited” (remarried), even if it is ten years after her husband’s demise,” explains Alice. “A widow has no voice at all in the home and cannot choose whom to inherit her after her husband is dead. A man is brought to her to inherit (remarry) whether she likes it or not. The inheritor must be treated like a king by the widow because he is considered a redeemer. Without him this widow cannot build another house, cannot go to the marketplace to buy food, or even touch somebody’s goods like maize, vegetables, or fish, as she is considered unclean. The inheritor is believed to make her clean.”

“A woman is inherited whether the husband had died of AIDS or any other STD,” she continues. “Most inheritors inherit the widows for a period of time and then move to other women, thus spreading the disease like bush fire. That is why the Luo’s have lost many young men and women to this disease, leaving helpless widows and orphans.”

In order to give these desperate widows and children a new life, Nyalwodep had to work against this deep-rooted custom in order to provide the widows with safety, as well as an opportunity to achieve the independence and self-reliance they need to survive without an “inheritor.” Thus, Alice’s aim was twofold: to battle the outmoded and destructive customs of the Luo, and to provide training for the widows in skills that would help them become self-sufficient, thus decreasing the cultural pressure on them to remarry. This year, Amistad joined Alice in her struggle to save the lives and dignity of Luo AIDS widows and orphans.

Nyalwodep also began construction of a widow’s duplex, a place of refuge for widows in crisis, such as those who are very ill and need care, or those who have been newly “chased-from-homes.” Amistad is helping Alice complete the construction.

Pam and Gerald Clifford are an Australian couple who, with several of their friends, have helped the Oumas establish Nyalwodep by raising funds for buildings, sewing, gardening and soap-making classes. “The scattered nature of the homes of the widows (with no one near to help or care for them) was the main reason for building the little duplex for anyone injured, seriously sick, or even terminally ill. In the duplex, the other widows and older orphans can be of help,” writes Pam to Amistad.

Alice has built a one-classroom school for her orphans, but with only two teachers to teach the 72 children living in and around the Nyalwodep community, there is a need to build more classrooms to accommodate the students. Alice would also like to build a small clinic for the AIDS victims.

The classroom and other rooms are also used in the afternoons for the widows’ classes and activities, such as training in modern agricultural activities, pottery, basketry, embroidery, and small business enterprise.

There are several dozen widows living in the rural areas surrounding the Nyalwodep compound, mostly in one-room mud-and-pole thatched houses. One such woman is Emily, whose husband died in 1997, leaving her alone to care for their seven children and three grandchildren in their two-room grass-thatched and mud-walled house.

“Unfortunately for Emily,” writes Alice, “her late husband had not built his own homestead and still resided in his father’s land. It was difficult for Emily to be helped. Since culture demands that a widow must be inherited before she can build a new house, nobody could touch the house even for repairs even if her house should fall down. Her in-laws didn’t want her on the property, and not being inherited, she had no home of her own.” Nyalwodep helped to place Emily in her two-roomed house. A tree canopy is her kitchen.

“Emily earns her living by cooking french fries, and selling snacks such as peanuts,” continues Alice. “She is very hardworking, but still cannot afford the school fees for her children.”

After breaking with traditional Luo custom, the widows in Nyalwodep have often been estranged from friends and family who are angry with the women who dare to stand on their own, and survive without being “inherited.”

“These widows all show tremendous courage in breaking with custom,” Pam Clifford tells Amistad.

Thanks to the generous donors of Amistad, money has been provided to Nyalwodep to fund the completion of the widow’s duplex, to purchase a Toyota AE100 for transporting ill widows to the hospital for treatment and also purchase of a large water tank.

The Luo tribe has many other customs which are also outright dangerous to the health of the people. Ouma is hoping to open a small clinic which cannot only treat patients but also serve as an agent
of change. Alice tells us of some unsafe practices she would like to change.

When a Luo turns 18 they must have all six lower teeth extracted as a rite of passage to adulthood. Often one unsterilized extraction tool is used for more than fifteen young people, thus risking transmission of AIDS and hepatitis.

Luo midwives are called Nyamrerwa. They have no training and most have no equipment. Sometimes a dirty razor is used to cut the umbilical cord, which can given the baby tetanus. In cases of ectopic pregnancy the midwife is unable to help and the pregnant women die to internal bleeding. When a placenta doesn’t come out after the birth, the mother often dies. While Ouma encourages mothers to go to clinics and hospitals, her current goal is to build a small clinic so that Luo women can receive basic care and good preventive health education. We also hope to help more village women start small enterprises.