Ama Ata Aidoo - Author HARDtalk

lying. Now on BBC News, it's time for

HARDtalk. Welcome to HARDtalk. I am Zainab

Badawi. My guest today is the acclaimed Ghanaian writer Ama Ata

Aidoo. A former education minister for a brief period under Jerry

Rawlings in Ghana, she has done arguably more than any other writer

to depict and celebrate the condition of women in Africa, in

books such as The Dilemma of a Ghost and Changes. Ama Ata Aidoo is

opposed to what she has described as a 'western perception that the

African female is a downtrodden wretch'. But when you look around

the African continent today, girls abducted in Nigeria, polygamy

re`introduced in Kenya, child marriages and the prevalence of

gender`based violence, how much is there to celebrate about being

female in Africa? Ama Ata Aidoo, welcome to HARDtalk.

Thank you very much, Zainab. There are a lot of political issues and

social affairs in your writings. How much do you see yourself as a writer

with a mission? Well, now, in retrospect, I suppose I could

describe myself as a writer with a mission. But I never was aware that

I had a mission when I started to write, you see. It didn't work ` it

doesn't work like that. I don't sit at my desk and say, now I've got to

depict this, and depict that. No, I was rather young when I started

writing, first of all. So I didn't even have any notion of where my

writing would be read, or how, and stuff like that. So

So it wasn't a conscious decision, but when did you become aware of the

fact that you were really depicting African women in a certain way?

Well, I mean, I suppose by the time I wrote my first piece, The Dilemma

of a Ghost, I knew that I was writing about women, or writing

women the way I knew them. Right? And then people sometimes

question me, for instance, why are your women are so strong? And I say,

that is the only woman I know. For instance, in 1970, you wrote a play,

Anowa, about a woman who refuses an arranged marriage. She is very

independent, hard`working, articulate and intelligent. Is that

how you see African women? Yes. When they ` that is how I see African

women. But how can you see African women like that? How do you see

African women? I have to tell you that, for instance, you see African

women are likely to be married off, at a young age. Yes. And we see

female genital mutilation, prevalent in Africa. In quite a few African

countries, maybe 20 or 30 African countries, as high as 90% in some

cases. You see girls falling out of secondary education, more likely

than boys, so isn't that the harsh reality of what is to be an African

woman? Yes, but it is not how it is to be an African woman. It is what

African women become, when they are put under such pressures as you are,

you know, telling me. What I am saying is that the African woman is

like a woman anywhere. Can you really say that when 85% of the

women in Africa are working in vulnerable employment? They grow 80%

of the continent's food, and yet in most cases they have no entitlement

to that land that they toil on for hours ` backbreaking work. What

happened to the notion of potential? My point is that when a woman has

been socialised into, I don't want to use the word oppressed, but when

a woman has been put under pressure, when she has been socialised into a

certain space, and she is being that woman in that space, that doesn't

mean that, you know, that is all there is to her.

My problem with seeing African women as the quintessentially world's

oppressed, and so on and so forth, is that it removes any agency from

African women. As if we are just there, you know, to be oppressed. To

make babies. And mind you, and if you don't mind me saying this, it is

not all African societies that practice female genital mutilation.

And Africa is not the only place where it is done. Sure, it happens

in the Middle East as well. Yes. You have said you are very averse to the

western perception that the African female... World perception. World

perception of the African female is a downtrodden wretch. You are also

seen as perhaps the most paramount African feminist. Do you describe

yourself as a feminist? I am a feminist, yes. And you don't think

that is a bit of a loaded term, associated with 1970s women's

liberation, women burning their bras in western capitals? So what if they

were burning their bras? I mean, the feminists, if you say that a

feminist is just somebody, not necessarily a woman, who believes in

the potential of women to get to the highest possible level of

development ` you know, given the facilities a society makes

available. Just as any man, and being a

feminist is not necessarily being a woman feminist. Feminism is an

ideology, like socialism. A man too can be a feminist. Do you believe

then that feminism is feminism regardless of where you live in the

world? Whether it is Norway or Nigeria? Or, do you believe that

there is an African feminism more strongly rooted in the social

conditions and culture of these people? I certainly do believe. You

know, it is... What, that there is an African feminism? Well, I think

there is an African feminism. It does not go around describing itself

as an African feminism. What I am trying to say is that feminism is an

ideology. And it depends how it is formulated, or how it is negotiated.

Depends upon the details of the particular environment. So there

isn't such a thing in your view as African feminism per se? No. Because

a lot of women writers write about this particular issue. Let me give

you one example so people know. Iman Hassan, a writer on Voices of Africa

in South Africa, part of a stable of newspapers in South Africa, says the

reality is that African feminists do not fit into the western context of

feminism, as it is a middle`class white female phenomenon. Traditional

western feminist rights emerge from individuals within the context of

their societies. I don't ` I mean, I can see her point, but I don't have

to agree with it. What is the point she is making? Well, the point she

seems to be making is that you know, European, western feminists are so

different. They may be white, they may be middle`class, and so on and

so forth. But you see, if we relaxed a bit, and looked at what we mean

when we say a feminist, then it doesn't really matter. What is a

feminist, in your view? I have tried to define it here this afternoon.

The feminist is anybody, and I mean anybody, who desires that women and

girls would have what is available ` whatever is available in society, in

the way of facilities, for their optimum development.

So whatever men can do? For shelter, for education, for nourishment, yes.

Are there differences between African and western women? Well,

there are. There are differences. To begin with, we were colonised as

Africa. We were first conquered, and then colonised. That also applies to

African males. Yes. Will let me put this point to you. From celebrated

writer and great admirer of yours Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. In fact,

she said I occupy the space of a black African happy feminist, and

she says she is inspired by you. But this is what she also says. I do

find that women in the West have brought into the idea that somehow

they are incomplete without a man. Women in Nigeria ` she is Nigerian `

may think they are incomplete without children, but not

necessarily without a man. Yes, well, I know what she is saying. And

I would agree with her. But I would also point out to her that in

today's Nigeria, in today's Ghana, given what the churches are pumping

out and how society is being changed, negotiated, very soon we

will leave that nice place. Young women who are about the same

age of my daughter or younger think they are not complete without men. I

see what she is saying. Yes, and it is also articulated by one black

activist, Owen Alik Shanadah, an African scholar and film director

who says feminism is part of warfare against the African family unit, and

seeks to erode age`old human values while claiming to serve the

interests of it. He supports women's rights, but I am just saying, this

idea that you've got family units in Africa, developing the idea from

earlier, that women value having children in Africa, and without the

idealistical approach from the West. These ideas are fine, but I think

you ought to get away from some of them, in the sense that the African

` at the end of everything else, we are African women. Women, and human

beings. What I am trying to say is that valuing family, having

children, is not the same as assuming that all one's existence on

us is to make babies. Cows do that too. You see what I am

saying? I do see what you are saying. And when people say it that

feminists are coming to ruin African life, what exactly do they mean? Let

me give you an example then. In 1991 you published Changes. And you

actually won the Commonwealth Writer's Prize. For Africa. For best

book, for Africa, yes, in 1992, so you were celebrated. So you have a

love story chronicling... I think it was '92 that Changes came out. And

you won the prize. You have chronicled a period of the life of a

career`centred African woman who divorces her first husband, marries

into a polygamist union, and she is tussling with the experience of

trying to live her western ideas of what a relationship should we, with

her African husband. But wait, why do you say that she is trying to

live a western idea of a relationship? Let me put it as a

question to you, are there conflicts in values between western`educated

African women going back to live in their societies? But listen, let's

set this terminology, western ` can we talk about Africa, you know,

without pushing us into the western tube all the time? I could take,

rather, an adjective like modern, or contemporary. But western? First of

all, like everybody everywhere, the life we are living, I thought we

were in some kind of a global village. And you know, we are

dealing with everybody, apart from... We were colonised, yes.

So... What... Half of our lives, you know, or quite a big chunk of it, is

influenced by the West. But that's not the sum total of who we are.

Quake and exploring your character in this book.

We know that polygamy is accented in African society. In Kenya, a man can

marry as many women as he wants to. That is... It is ridiculous. It is

absolutely painful. Because, you see, the difference between a woman

like Essie in my book, Changes, and she is not unique in that sense,

because there have been highly educated African women who have very

clearly and willingly and readily entered into polygamous

relationships. Is that right or wrong in your view? It is not for me

to judge. It is for the individual. Because, as far as they are

concerned, it is right. And if it is right for them, we have to allow it.

(CROSSTALK). Western feminists would say they find polygamy something

difficult to swallow. Especially when it is institutionalised. I am

not asking them to swallow it. It goes on all over Africa. I'm just

depicting it in the light of one African woman. This year, what many

see as a retrograde step has taken place in Kenya. I agree with you.

When we look at polygamy, we know perfectly well that the majority of

women who are railroaded into it don't have what it takes for them to

make independent choices. They don't have the education, the wherewithal

in terms of independence... Your character in Changes was an educated

woman entering into a polygamous union. For Essie, polygamy offered

something fantastic. Because, as far as she is concerned... Isn't that

women colluding in their own oppression? And I will tell you what

a spokeswoman for the Federation of Women's Lawyers said, we are happy

with the law, finally, because all marriages are treated equally. They

said they weren't happy with the fact a man does not need permission

to marry a wife, but they were happy because it makes them legal. Yes,

you see, I disagree with her. Because, what happens in polygamous

relationships is that, depending upon not the man's economic position

in society, but the women's, it is oppressive and can never be excused.

I didn't come out in Changes with guns blazing against polygamy

because I thought it would be more interesting to let Essie go through

her own paces and come to her own conclusions about what polygamy is.

A man who can marry two wives can marry three. That is how she got

this illusion. `` disillusioned. Then, the relationship... Broke

down. Let me ask you this, no`one is going to tolerate the oppression of

women. So, how is it best to counter the oppression of women? Legal

rights are insufficient. How do you overcome social barriers? Educate

women. Education, education, education. And I am not the first

person to have said that. Give women, like men, give them the

tools. They will live their own lives. They will negotiate their own

position in society. Educate women. They will even make fewer children

and make people happy. All of these people who are whining about

population and African women making too many children, which is not

true. That is the only solution. But how do you overcome patriarchal

laws, women can't inherit property laws. Security of land and property

comes from your mother's mother... That is the exception for the whole

of Africa. Yes, but it is also valid. That is one good example you

have given. But if you look at parliamentarians in Ghana, you have

got 11% of MPs in Ghana who are women, that is pitiful. It is

disastrous. But you see, I don't want to blame other people for our

problems. What I'm trying to say is that although the basis of a

society, the majority ethnic group, whatever, is naturally... ``

matrilineal. OK. When the British came, did they come with their male

culture? You know what I am trying to say? You bring in the British

because your grandfather was killed by neo` colonialists. Yes. But

nevertheless, there was a paradox because you were sent to a Wesley

girl's high school for a Western education. Do you think you should

have had a more Afrocentric approach to education? Today, all over

Africa? Of course. And we don't see that always. Because, another one,

all of those men who have led Africa for the last 500 years think they

are the only ones who can save Africa. But, they are not giving

Africans, the people, the right to build alternative structures. You

need to indigenise, don't you? And, celebrate being African. Let me tell

you, the late African Nobel Peace Prize laureate said, it would be

good to recapture some of the positive aspects of our culture. And

yet, Western educated elites, such as you yourself, you have spoken in

the United States. I agree with... Is that happening? It is not

happening, because the people... Listen, I was Minister for

Education, right? In 1982, for 18 months. My point is that what we

should be actually looking into is what happens to the ideas that would

change Africa and the people who, you know, espouse, articulate such

ideas. What happens to people. My point is that in Africa, maybe like

in other places, it is not the people, always the people who want

to do the changing who get near the power. OK. Briefly on this point, as

you said, you were education minister in 1982. You resigned when

you realised you could not make education freely accessible to all.

It is still a challenge. Broadly speaking. Ghana is doing OK. Still,

you find that secondary education is a big issue not only in Ghana but in

other African countries. Do you think you should have stuck to

politics rather than gone to writing? Would you have better

served Ghana and Africa had you stuck with politics? You know, I am

trying to work myself out of the guilt thing. So, my answer is, no. I

think it was a good idea. It was so better move for me to get out of

government and do my writing. But, of course, I am also human and every

now and then I wonder whether I should not have stayed. Ama Ata

Aidoo, thank you very much indeed for coming on HARDtalk. You are most

welcome. Hello there. Well, with

high`pressure dominating the scene for much of this week, is looking

settled and dry with plenty of sunshine. Risk of thunderstorms

increasing as we head towards the latter part of the week. Monday was

a fine day across much of the UK. Barely a shower or storm around. And

it