International
Widows Day on 23^rd June 2013 highlights the ongoing plight of
widows worldwide and the need for action towards achieving both recognition and
full rights. Absent from
statistics, disregarded by many researchers and overlooked by many national,
local and civil society organisations, widows are virtually invisible in the
wider world.

In many
countries, once a woman’s husband dies she no longer has a social status and
can be subjected to many forms of abuse. A woman’s social status is often
linked to her husband’s, meaning that when she is widowed she loses not only
her husband, but her place within society. If widows are not forced into re-marriage,
they can be evicted from their homes and ostracised from their families and
communities. In extreme cases, widows can be killed for the shame caused upon
their own families; practices that are deemed justifiable by religious or
cultural practice.

Widows often
have no or limited rights to inheritance or land ownership and therefore very
little financial means to support themselves and their families. In numerous cases,
widows are prevented from the right to ownership of property from their birth
family. Without financial means, many rely on charitable donations from their
husbands’ relatives. In India, a vast number of widows are forced
to pursue work such as domestic labour or turn to prostitution and begging as a
result of being disowned by their families.

In relation
to disputes over land and property inheritance rights, widows may also be victims
of physical and mental abuse. This practice is common across Africa and Asia. Women are often coerced into
degrading practices and rituals to mourn the loss of their husbands. These
practices can often be life-threatening, such as the traditional practice of
being forced to drink the water that the husband’s corpse has been washed in
before burial.

Soroptimist Action, Advocacy and
Awareness-Raising on widows

The plight of
widows is familiar to Soroptimists, and a number of projects have been
established to aid widows worldwide:

In Fiji, in order to provide widows in the
local area with a source of financial income, one of the Soroptimist
International clubs (SI Ba) assisted a group of vulnerable women to establish
an income-generating business. ‘Shady Cool Enterprises’ has been set up as a
small business whereby women can advance their cookery skills and earn an
income from the food that they produce. Widows are also involved in
handicrafts, producing and selling goods.

Project
Mwezi in Kenya was established by SI Jersey to be
a multi-functional project assisting different groups of women and girls in Kenya. Soroptimist Jersey raised funds to
send to widowed women in the village of Rabai, Kenya. These funds went directly to a
sewing group of widowed women to enable them to make products. Among the items
that the sewing group made were washable sanitary towels for young girls
attending school and other young girls who live in an orphanage in Mombasa.

In
partnership with the Mums for Mums NGO in Ethiopia, Soroptimist groups in the Northern Ireland region have been undertaking
various fundraising activities in order to donate funds to the Mums for Mums
organisation. They have helped to build and equip a day centre for elderly and
widowed women. The centre helps to educate and provide healthcare for widows
and young girls traumatised by war in Ethiopia.

Soroptimist
International demands greater respect for widows around the
world and will continue to work for the recognition of widows rights.

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 Pictures taken from SI Ba, Fiji