US Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.
Shout out to all single parents, or as my good friend Clay Muganda says, unmarried parents. Whatever you choose to label parents who raise their kids on their own, you have to admit that they are very good at it. Just look at Kamala ‘Khamala Wefwe’ Harris. The first woman and person of colour to become an American vice-president.
Her track record prior to running with Joe Biden may be a bit problematic, but who’s isn’t? The point is that she is just one sneeze away from the most visible presidency in the world. She’s a woman and a half, and as is very often the case, one who stood on the shoulders of other great women, the greatest of whom was her mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris. Kamala mentioned her many times on the campaign trail, but this statement stood out for me:
“My mother, who raised me and my sister, was a proud woman. She was a brown woman. She was a woman with a heavy accent. She was a woman who many times, people would overlook, or not take seriously. Because of her accent, people assumed things about her intelligence. But every time my mother proved them wrong. And because of who my mother was, what she believed, what she had the ability to believe was possible, and then ‘work’ to make possible – the fact that my mother never asked anyone permission to tell her what was possible, is why within one generation I stand here as a serious candidate for president of the United States.”
While she didn’t pursue her bid for the presidency, Kamala was selected from a field of very qualified women to run on the Biden ticket. And as we all know, she is now the first biracial woman in the history of the US to ascend to the vice-presidency. That’s one hell of an achievement for a child of immigrants who was raised by a single mother. Kamala’s mother was a highly-accomplished biomedical scientist who was routinely discounted because of her accent and skin colour. But as Kamala says, her mother never asked permission to be great, and she taught her daughters to approach life in the same way. Kamala is very clearly the product of her mother’s upbringing.
Single parents – both mothers and fathers – start off from a disadvantage because there is an unspoken expectation that children should be raised in two-parent families. Parents who buck that rule work hard to give their children the same opportunities that kids from two-parent homes get without asking.
They often go above and beyond first, to groom their children to succeed, and two, to give them the resources they need for success. This is because there is an implicit expectation that children from single-family homes are more likely to fail. To paraphrase the words of Stacey Abrams, who is yet another phenomenal black American woman, they are often underestimated, and as a result they strive to over-perform.
Single-parenthood aside, the US election showcases the strength, intelligence, and fortitude of women at every level. Behind many successful endeavours, be they in the home or in the workplace, there is often a woman, a team led by a woman, or an alliance of women. Women are uniquely endowed and positioned to make things work and to keep them working not just for ourselves, but for humanity in general.
Decision-making
It’s unfortunate that we are not celebrated as often as we should be; that in many countries around the world, Kenya included, women are broadly excluded from high-level decision-making processes. It’s obvious that women have what it takes to lead, and to lead with excellence. Too bad that it has taken America hundreds of years to elevate a woman, and a person of colour no less, to the position of vice-president. In Kenya, we have the benefit of learning from their missteps, which means we don’t have to wait for centuries to take women in leadership seriously.
Kenyan women leaders do not need to ask anyone to tell them what’s possible. Anything and everything is possible especially when women stand on the shoulders and draw on the strength of the women who went before them. We have our own rich history of women standing up for what is just, what is right, and what is possible – we owe it to our ancestors to carry the baton past the finish line and stake our claim on the highest offices in our land.
Ms Masiga is Peace and Security editor, The Conversation
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