The world has been talking about 2020 in the last decade or so for as long as we could remember. For a while, it felt so far away but on December 31, 2019, at exactly midnight we popped our fireworks and screamed Happy New Year truly hoping that it would be so. This was supposed to be the year for dreams to come true and hopes of the future to be made, the Olympics that unite us every 4 years and the United States are supposed to have their presidential elections that affect the global economy at large and as for a 21-years old Malawian young womn like me, this was the year I was going to graduate college, the start of a new decade of my life, the decade I build my story, my career and possibly start a family of my own.

 

When news broke out of the first COVID-19 case in Malawi I was sitting for my final college examinations and the president of the country had declared a state of emergency and one of the preventive measures was that all schools be closed but I was lucky enough to have finished my exams before my university closed. For so many of us, this pandemic has disrupted our education. As young people, we constantly experience the pressure of becoming more but now we are facing uncertainty on top of that and it is quite mind baffling.

 

We all know the saying “when you educate a girl child, you educate a nation” and in these uncertain and quite chaotic times, it is important to not forget her. Education is for so many of us success, security, stability and even a mere option for others but for a majority of young African women, especially those living in rural and marginalized areas, it is freedom in its literal meaning. It is no secret that a majority of African norms and cultural practices are dominantly shaped against the girl child from female genital mutilation to sexual initiation rituals and early child marriages as well as beliefs that strip widows of their late husband’s property. 

 

Education gives these young women awareness of the harms these practices have on their well-being and it allows them to know that they have a choice, a say in their lives as well as providing the opportunity for them to become independent and escape these harsh realities in their particular communities. Knowledge reminds women that we are not subhuman, it gives us awareness of our beauty, significance, abilities and power, and it empowers us and allows us space to unapologetically be ourselves. I recall watching the Miss Universe 2019 pageant and when the winner Miss South Africa, Zozibini Tunzi was asked about the most important thing we should teach young girls today, she responded “I think the most important thing we should be teaching young girls today is leadership.” She continued to explain on how society has labeled women to be and how it has been a barrier to achieving that and she concluded by encouraging young girls to take up space in society. In that moment I didn’t believe anyone was more deserving of the crown. She stood up for us in the most graceful and powerful way.

 

As one of my role models, COO of Facebook Sheryl Sandberg says in her book Lean In; Women, Work, and the Will to Lead that “we can reignite the revolution by internalizing the revolution. The shift to a more equal world will happen person by person. We move closer to the larger goal of true equality with each woman who leans in.” She explained that when women take up leadership roles they are able to pave the way for other women as well as teardown external barriers that are hindering women from succeeding and this is true even for these African cultural practices that treat women like subhumans, that deny us our basic rights and brainwash us to believe that we were merely created to satisfy a man. Indeed, knowledge is power and education is how women can take up these leadership roles in different fields, speak up and make significant changes in our societies. However, during this pandemic, as physical gatherings have been banned to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, a majority of institutions have resorted to online learning as a way to preserve education but this circumstance has exposed the digital divide between different classes of society, while learning has continued for some, it has completely stopped for people with no access to the internet, computers or smartphones and who lack the knowledge on how to use these resources. In these uncertain times this has resulted to early child marriages, which also leads to early pregnancies and increased rate in school dropouts.

 

This is a wakeup call for us to strive for our societies to meet the rest of the world as it is advancing in technology. It is important to find strategic ways to preserve learning for those who are not afforded the same access to technology and whether that means provision of reusable masks and hand sanitizers to students, distribution of books and food stuffs or distancing of desks in classrooms as well as the inclusion of information technology as a compulsory subject in public schools. The hope of a brighter Africa is determined by how well the youth are equipped with the skills needed to develop it. The vision is not gone; it might be blurry but we can still see and it is still possible.