Public urged to respect rights of widows

The Brong-Ahafo Regional Coordinator of the Widows Society, (Akunafo Kuo), Mr. Kwame Anokye, has appealed to the public to respect the rights of widows in the society.

He observed that most people look down on widows and said certain traditional practices have also contributed to the harassment and embarrassment widows go through in our communities.

Statistics available to the UN indicate that there are an estimated 245 million widows worldwide, 115 million of whom live in poverty and suffer from social stigmatization and economic deprivation purely because they have lost their husbands.

In the Brong-Ahafo region, there is an average of 50 widows in each of the 22 districts and municipalities, bringing the total number of widows in the region to a minimum of 1,100.Kwame Anokye was speaking to Space FM’s Francis Owusu-Ansah in Sunyani in commemoration of the UN International Day for Widows which falls on June 23, every year.

The International Widows day draws awareness to the need to address the “poverty and injustice faced by millions of widows and their dependents in many countries including Ghana”.Mr. Anokye noted that traditional authorities would have to reconsider some practices which dehumanize widows.

The Widows Coordinator said the regional society which was formed in 2005, currently has 180 members, down from the initial membership of 250. There are several others who are unregistered members.

Mr. Anokye explained that the number has gone down because some members have remarried and officially withdrawn their membership.

“Any time a member remarries, we perform a farewell ceremony for her and officially withdraws her membership status” he said.

Mr. Anokye said the society periodically educates widows on their rights and urged civil societies to also put in place adequate measures and programmes to protect the rights of widows. He added that there are plans to establish branches of the society in all the ten regions of Ghana

A number of widows who spoke to Space FM expressed reservations about the treatment meted out to them by the society especially by relatives of their dead husbands.

The widows believe that the notion that wives are responsible for the death of their husbands is crude and must be discarded completely. They appealed to civil organizations and the churches in particular to educate the public on how to treat widows in the society.

International Widows Day was established by the Loomba Foundation to raise awareness of the issue of widowhood. The significance of 23 June is that it was on that day in 1954 that Shrimati Pushpa Wati Loomba-mother of the Foundation’s founder, Lord Loomba–herself became a widow.

The first International Widows Day took place in 2005.Since that time, the scale of the event has grown, with events across the world timed to commemorate the day of awareness.