Con-court liberates women

Post Correspondent
In one of her hit songs “If I were a Boy” Beyonce Kowles, wife to popular American rapper Jay-Z laments the abuse, pain and neglect women suffer at the hands of men and she wishes for a reversal of roles or gender so that she could show men how it’s ought to be done or the man would feel how it hurts to be abused as a woman.

Here goes part of the song; Verse 1 ‘If I were a boy even just for a day, I would roll outta bed in the morning and throw on what I wanted and go, drink beer with the guys and chase after girls, I would kick it with whoever I had and I would never get confronted for it, cause they would stick up for me” Chorus ‘If I were a boy I think I could understand how it feels to love a girl, I swear I would be a better man. I would listen to her cause I know it hurts when you lose the one you wanted cause he has taken you for granted and everything you had got destroyed”

Verse (2) “If I were a boy I would turn off my phone, tell everyone it’s been broken so they think that I was sleeping alone. I would put myself first and make the rules as I go cause I know that she will be faithful waiting for me to come home (to come home)”

There we go. Being a man myself and having also been “guilty” of wrongly treating women, whether be it in business, family or social life, I have decided to change and try to become the man intended by God and at the same time try to learn how good men treat women. Over the years I have observed that women are what their society make them barring natural circumstances.

We take a look at our case here in Zimbabwe. A few years back when men were focused and providing for their families cases of prostitution and cheating were not as bad as they are today. You will notice today that the weight of fending for a family has literally been borne by women especially after the economic meltdown. Women took on the role by venturing into different projects some of them very risky like border jumping or cross-border trading.

In these endeavours the dexterous women would still meet the marauding men who would not serve them or assist them unless they pay a bribe or pay in kind which would only worsen their predicament. While they will be busy trying to bring food on their families’ tables, they also have to battle with a tormenting conscience after married women would have been forced to “cheat” their spouses by the same men who would latter accuse them of being loose or prostitutes. This now brings me to the recent Constitutional Court ruling outlawing the arbitrary arrest of women accused of loitering around for purposes of prostitution.

I am not condoning prostitution but justice and fairness is the basis for any strong society. By suspecting that every woman walking alone at night or standing in a certain place is actually out to seek for sexual clients is not only unfair but degrading to say the least. In other words we are saying women are second class citizens who should be stripped of certain freedoms including freedom of movement in their own country any time they want to do that. What is intriguing in this whole issue is the fact that most deserving criminals or suspects have gone unpunished after police claim that there was no complainant or report on the matter and so police cannot arrest but the police can arrest women hanging out at night without a report or complaint by anyone.

Moreover there will not be even an evidence of prostitution except for suspicion that these people are out for mischief. The police would also do well by arresting men moving around at night or standing in corners for purposes of stealing or robbery. That would make it fair. Say It’s true that these women would be out there for prostitution, would it really then stop prostitution because at the end of the day we need to interrogate why all of a sudden our sisters have turned to this degrading trade.

Moreover after arresting these women their also have been allegations against some of the arresting officers who mostly would be males asking for a bribe to release the ‘suspects’ or they have been alleged to ask for the same sexual favours they are arresting them for. One young lady, a whizkid who recently came out with 19 points at ‘A’ level in Sciences couldn’t have say it any better. Sharon Chapungu was at my office this other day and as we were discussing life she ended up rightly concluding that ‘this world we live in is a man’s world’.

I agree with her because men have gotten away with murder on several occasions. Which reminds of this guy I met at a food outlet and he was worried he was going to jail. When I asked him why he said that he had found some text messages in his wife’s phone which suggested that she was having an affair and so he decided to force their daughter to drink poison and he also took that poison in a bid to commit suicide. The child died as a result of the poison but the man survived and now he is facing trial. When I asked him to tell me how many married women he also had slept with he could not help but only smile in acknowledgement of his own hypocrisy which is also the hypocrisy of many a man out there.

Men have literally awarded themselves unfettered powers, rights and title deeds to cheating and extra marital affairs but they are the quickest to cry foil when it happens to them. Jesus, the greatest man of all time exposed such levels of hypocrisy when he embarrassed Sadducees and Pharisees who had captured this women in adultery and so wanted to stone her but not before they had sought Jesus’ thoughts on the case. Jesus in his wisdom, fairness and justice asked anyone person in the group who had no sin of his own to first throw the stone and surprisingly one by one they all left without hurting the woman. If men would take Jesus’ approach then our women would feel safe in this world and reform.

They just need to be loved and looked after. It’s a different case when a woman who is loved and cared for still goes on to cheat.

The Manica Post some time ago reported two disturbing case of male chauvinism. One involved Mike Dhaka husband to May Maradzika.