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Strength of a
March, 2011
Woman
Dr Jennifer Riria Banking on wom I
By Florence Sipalla
f you travel around the country, you will not fail to notice the Kenya Women Finance Trust (KWFT) signage. This is the microfinance arm of the Kenya Women Group (KWG) that is regulated by the Central Bank. The entity is now known as KWFT DTM, a deposit taking microfinance. The relatively young microfinance business in Kenya is intertwined with the history of KWFT DTM, the oldest microfinance organisation that serves a niche market of the women in Kenya. They have the widest network in the microfinance business that covers both the rural and urban woman. At the helm of Kenya Women’s Group, the umbrella organisation that hosts Kenya Women Finance Trust Deposit Taking Microfinance (KWFT DTM) and Kenya Women’s Holding is Dr Jennifer Riria, a gender activist, lecturer and microfinance expert.
Schooling Riria is a firm believer in women and their ability to surmount challenges they face. “In this organisation, we don’t talk of problems,” she asserts, adding that talking of problems makes a challenge seem impossible to overcome. Hailing from a humble background in Meru, as a child Riria dreamt and prayed for something different. She reflects on the difficult circumstances the women in her village faced, which condemned them to a cycle of poverty. This drove her to strive for a different life. “I used to pray for God to take me far from there and it happened.” On completing primary education, Riria went to Precious Blood Kilungu in Makueni County, after which she joined University of Dar es Salaam for her undergraduate degree. She would later proceed to Leeds
University for her postgraduate studies. Riria credits Dar for having shaped her. She learnt “to think, articulate herself and refuse to be intimidated”. As a young lecturer at Kenyatta University, she was not afraid to take up the leadership mantle. In addition to teaching and studying for her PhD, she was a women’s rights activist and the representative of all staff in the Senate. She pushed the institution into starting a counselling department for students to seek advice. When she left the university, Riria joined UNICEF as a consultant working on the programme ‘Women education for child survival’ which took into cognizance the fact that chances of child mortality are reduced when the mother is educated.
Empowerment Women’s empowerment has always been her driving force. Her PhD thesis was on women, education and development. At the time, this was such a new area of study and she had difficulties finding a supervisor to replace Prof Micere Mugo who had gone into exile. Drawing strength from her mother, Riria says: “I watched my mum go through a lot with ten children in a rural setting and she had nothing. I saw her go unappreciated, with no food when there was little.” She pledged to spend her first salary to change her mother’s life. “I wanted to get my mum the best dress, shoes, fill her granary to ensure she does not go without food.” Much as her mother was illiterate, this did not stop her parents from supporting their daughter’s quest for education. This perhaps explains where she draws the passion for education. Riria has taken personal interest in a mentorship programme for the youth run by the organisation. “The youth is so critical at the moment.
Prof Cecilia Wangechi
First woman Professor of Mathemati
I
By Wilfred Muchire
f ever a theme for International Women’s Day was timely, then it is so for Cecilia Wangechi Mwathi. The 2011 theme for International Women’s Day is: Equal access to education, training and science and technology: Pathway to decent work for women. Whether it is a myth or reality it is said that many women fear or have a phobia for science subjects. While women are said not to be able to get good paying careers for fear of science and mathematics, a few women are riding on top of their chosen paths having excelled in these subjects. Mwathi has always been seen as crazy due to her love for figures, which is the main ingredient in the world of Mathematics.
Motivation
During a motivational talk which at her former primary school recently, Mwathi said: “For the few of us who chose science subjects, people believed there had to be something wrong with us. Either you were shaggy, ugly or had no boyfriend. This I have heard for all my life as a student of mathematics. The source of those unfounded arguments is still a mystery to me. But I always knew a day would come for me to have my sweet success.” Apart from holding motivation talks in various schools, Mwathi has also written several books. Some of the books she
has authored include KCSE Golden Tips in Mathematics (2006), Form One Mathematics Work Book (2010) and Form Two Mathematics (2010). She is also Chief Editor, Journal of Agriculture, Science and Technology at Jomo Kenyatta University and the coordinator, Mathematics Mentoring Group. After years of struggle and hard work, Mwathi, 48, was recently crowned as the first woman Professor of Mathematics in Kenya. She recalls the numerous challenges she had to surmount before reaching where she is today. Mwathi was inspired to join the world of Mathematics to beat the belief that it could only be tackled by men. Since she did not want to fail in her studies and spend the rest of her life in the village fetching firewood and taking care of livestock, she decided to venture in the world of mathematics. Poverty was very much part of her life. During her formative days at Kaigonde and Gichira Primary Schools in Tetu District, Nyeri County, she had to walk for about five kilometres barefoot and at times without breakfast to get to school. She endured going to school without even an innerwear, after her only one was destroyed by a cow. Her parents had bought it after years of living without. “I still remember that evening when after school I washed my only innerwear and placed it on a fence to dry so that I could wear it the following morning. When I went to fetch water, I returned home to find it had
been partly eaten by our cow. I had to live without one for quite some time but this did not deter me from progressing,” she told hundreds of guests gathered at the school’s playground during the talks that also doubled as her home coming party since she was crowned the first Kenyan woman Mathematics professor. After completing her primary education, Mwathi was admitted to Mugoiri Girls’ High School in Murang’a where she sat for her ‘O’ level examinations.
Hardship
She still remembers how her parents bought her an oversize shoe when joining Form One. Her father’s argument was that by being oversize, she would be able to wear them for the next four years without outgrowing them before finishing Form Four. “I had to stuff papers inside my first ever pair of shoes so that it could fit me,” she recalls. Upon passing, she was admitted to Chania School (now Chania Boys’ High School) for Advanced level studies. Thereafter, she went to Kenyatta University, then a constituent college of University of Nairobi where she studied Mathematics and Physical Education (PE). She dropped PE due to its teacher being biased against girls. After graduating, she was posted to Garissa Secondary School before being transferred to Kenya High School. Later she stopped teaching and decided to explore the world of Mathematics.
It was a fulfilment of a dream I had since those days when words like logarithm, algebra, sounded exotic to me. Little did I know that those words and a host of their relatives would be the vehicle to the realisation of my dream.” As of last year, there were only seven women holding doctorate degrees in Mathematics but she is the only one who was elevated to the status of a professor after a teaching career of over 18 years at Jomo Kenyatta University of Science and Technology. She is currently teaching the same subject at Jomo Kenyatta University and some of it constituent colleges among them Kimathi University College in Nyeri. “There is nothing which is so difficult to anyone and one that cannot be handled by either gender as long as one has the willpower to counter it,” she reiterates. Born on May 15, 1963 to Isaiah Mwathi and Beatrice Mwathi at Gichira Village, Tetu District, Nyeri County, she was the fifth born in a family of eight children. Her foundation to education was laid at a nursery school in 1969 at Gichira Village between 1970-1974. She went to Kaigonde Primary School, a journey that took 12 km for a return trip. She never wore any shoes during the time she was in primary school. She was also very skimpily dressed as warm clothing was not known there then. “I developed asthma as a result of this which was a real challenge since the area is also hilly. There was a nearby school in Gichira but my father did not take me there
“There is no is so difficul and one th be handled gender as l has the wi count
– Prof Cecilia W