Thanks to the leadership and members of the Nigerian Muslim Community in Durban for their support and spiritual guidance during my stay and research in Durban. The subject of women's liberation movements has undoubtedly provoked intense debates among scholars, researchers, politicians, female political activists, feminists and advocates of women's liberation around the world from the colonial to the post-colonial era. Although women's role in the struggle for liberation in Africa undoubtedly occupies much time and space in history, there is little historical documentation compared to the men.
This study focuses on three issues: the motives for women's participation; nature of women's protest and the experiences of women as political prisoners. It is framed within post-colonial, intersectionality and resistance theories that seek to move women's voices from the margins to center stage in liberation narratives. The thesis contributes to a deeper insight into the trials and tribulations of women's participation in the liberation movements.
A comparative study of South Africa and Nigeria highlights commonalities and differences in the factors that shaped and determined women's resistance on the African continent.
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
FNWO Federation of Nigerian Women's Organizations FNWS Federation of Nigerian Women's Associations FEDSAW Federation of South African Women FEDTRAW Transvaal Federation of Women FA Feminist Africa. NCBWA National Congress of British West Africa NCAW National Council of African Women NCNC National Council of Nigeria and Cameroon National Council of Women's Societies NCWS National Women's Conference NWC. SWANU South West African National Union SUW Soviet Union Women's TANU Tanganyika African National Union.
UDF United Democratic Front UMBC United Middle Belt Congress UEA University Education Act UCT University of Cape Town. YWCA Young Women's Christian Association ZANLA Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army ZAWU Zimbabwe African Women's Union.
LIST OF MAPS
CHAPTER ONE
Therefore, this study compares and contrasts the roles of women in the liberation movements in both Nigeria and South Africa. A comparative study of women's role in the liberation movements in both Nigeria and South Africa provides a deeper insight into the gendered nature of women's participation on the African continent. Comparing African women's anti-colonial experiences across regions will fill this gap in the literature.
What were the different forms of protest used by Nigerian and South African women in the liberation struggle. To assess to what extent the role of women in liberation movements was gendered in a comparative framework. She was a farmer and participated in the women's liberation movement in Nigeria as a member of the defunct Enugu Women's Association and the Nigerian Women's Federation.
This chapter provides detailed analyzes of factors that motivated women's participation in liberation movements.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
The British Women's Liberation Movement (BWLM) was sparked by inequality in British society from the 1960s. 74 Florence Binard, 'The British Women's Liberation Movement in the 1970s: Redefining the Personal and the Political,' French Journal of British Studies XXII- Hors Serie (2017). The above quote highlights women's activism and their organization as one of the largest protest actions in the history of anti-colonial resistance in Zimbabwe.
130 Cheryl Johnson-Odim, "Women and Gender in Sub-Saharan African History." In Women's History in Global Perspectives. These works focus on interrogating early writings on women's history and nationalism in South Africa. Therefore, this study will contribute to the historiography of women's resistance to nationalist struggle on the African continent.
The theory gave me an understanding of the modern perspectives of Nigerian and South African women's role in the colonial and apartheid era, with particular reference to their roles in the struggle for liberation.
CHAPTER THREE
SOCIO-ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL CONDITIONS IN SOUTH AFRICA AND NIGERIA
For details on the migrant labor system, see Cherryl Walker, Gender and the Development of the Migrant Labor System c. 271 Mary Moodley was one of the activists who fought against victimization and police harassment for almost 20 years. This conference recommends to the parent body the necessity of reviving the women's work of the Congress v.
Suryakala Patel became a senior executive member of the TIC.291 The drive for radical change in the ANC and SAIC encouraged closer cooperation between African and Indian women.292 Dr. Goonam and Mrs Florence Matomela were women's anti-transition activists and provincial chairpersons of the African National Congress Women's League (ANCWL). This led to the formation of a military unit of the ANC (Umkhonto we Sizwe, also known as the Spear of the Nation).328.
Gqola, 'Contradictory Locations: Black women and the Discourse of the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa', Meridians. 357 Albertina Sisulu, wife of the then National Secretary of the ANC was born in the Transkei region and trained as a nurse. While in exile in Zimbabwe, she joined the military wing of the African National Congress.
383 “Indirect rule” was a British system of government introduced to the government of the Nigerian state in the early twentieth century. Traditional age and gender roles shifted as people responded to the new labor system of the. Wuraola Adepeju Esan was elected as the first member of the Federal Parliament from Ibadan West.
She was also a founding member of the National Council of Women's Societies (NCWS) while her region Mrs. By 1990 only one woman had emerged as Chairperson of Local Government in the South West with a few numbers of women elected to the Local Government Council elections. of the Third.
CHAPTER FOUR
MOTIVES FOR WOMEN’S PARTICIPATION IN THE LIBERATION MOVEMENT
At that time, Indian women lived under a patriarchal system and participation in political resistance challenged society's gender norms.454. Subsequently, the British East India Company monopolized the salt trade, making India one of the largest salt producers in the world in the early 1900s. She also influenced the establishment of NOW branches outside Durban, such as in the Inanda community.
In the same way, Theresa Mthembu, a political activist, was motivated by her deep religious convictions. This miserable condition of women made me join forces with other courageous women like Victoria Mxenge in the fight for women's emancipation. So, I became active at a very young age in the association of the Tie and Dye guild and in the Women's Union due to prohibition and taxation. 511.
Socio-economic factors have contributed in many ways to the causes of women's political activism in the struggle for liberation in both South Africa and Nigeria. For Their Triumphs and For Their Tears: Conditions and Resistance of Women in Apartheid South Africa: African Women in the Reserve (IDAF: International Defense & Aid Fund, 1975), 15. United Nations, "The Role of Women in the Against Apartheid, 1980," Extract from Paper Prepared by the Secretariat of the World Conference on the United Nations Decade for Women, (Copenhagen: United Nations, July 1980), 5.
Youth activism continued to rise up against racial discrimination and injustice in apartheid society. According to Mary Ntomela, NU played an important role and increased the role of women in the political struggle in the public sphere. In the 1940s, the ALC was formed in response to the marginalization of women and girls.
676 McIntosh, Marjorie "Context, Causes and Cultural Valuation of Yoruba and Baganda Women's Participation in the Public Economy", African Studies Program Working Papers. This chapter reveals the motives behind the participation of South African and Nigerian women in the liberation movements during the period under review.
CHAPTER FIVE
MODES OF PROTEST
Although in a tense environment, I had the opportunity to speak about the arrest and ban of the leadership of SASO.726. Hassim, Women's Organization and Democracy in South Africa: Contesting Authority (Madison: . University of Wisconsin Press See also SAHO 'Apartheid Crumbles, Women in the Turmoil of the 1980s,' 2019. One common form of nonviolent resistance was passive resistance also known like.
In the early 1980s, King Edward health workers in the Natal region went on strike. The first hospital movement in South Africa took place in 1981 when the King Edward Hospital in Natal went on strike.776 This protest action was successful as the collaboration of medical students and practicing doctors called on management to listen to women's complaints. The boycott was implemented due to the socio-economic consequences of colonialism and the Great Depression during the war years.
For example, the income of the women traders and farmers decreased, and the colonial government introduced a product inspection and price control system. The protest was known as the Women's Dance Movement (WDM).798 They started the protest from Atta in Okigwe Division (OD) of Owerri Province (OP) and spread to other parts of the province while dancing to the song. , and Europeans called to leave the country.799 The dance demonstration was called Nwaobiala in the Igbo language, otherwise known as "stranger leave".800 The women's dance protest was against the colonial. The above shows that the colonial officer expressed shock at the huge women protesters present at the palace of the traditional ruler of the Oloko community.
The beautiful voice of one of the women leaders, Ida Mntwana of the Transvaal ANC Women's League, can never be forgotten. The above quote depicts the personality of one of the South African women's freedom fighters, Ida Mntwana, whose powerful voice served as an instrument of protest. This sensitized the consciousness of the people about the socio-economic and political injustices of the apartheid government.
Similarly, on 16 December 1940, the LMWA through Herbert Macaulay wrote a seven page petition to the Commissioner of the Colony on taxation of women in Lagos. We demanded the presence of the SADF (South African Defense Force) as we feel safer with them.
CHAPTER SIX
WOMEN’S EXPERIENCES IN THE PRISONS
See also Hiralal, Narratives of Women Detained in the Kroonstad Prison During the Apartheid Era, 103. The stories of mistreatment of female prisoners in the prisons were never reported.1042.
