GREEN EDITION

6FEATURE

KING’S DAUGHTERS:

BEYOND SURVIVING

by Vida de Voss-Links • photograph Vida de Voss-Links

WHEN A FEW WOMEN DECIDED TO WALK AWAY FROM THEIR FORM OF SURVIVAL THEY DID NOT KNOW THEIR PATHS WOULD CROSS WITH A RECENTLY WIDOWED YOUNG WOMAN WHO ALSO SOUGHT A WAY TO PICK UP THE PIECES OF HER LIFE. THUS WAS BORN KING’S DAUGHTERS.

In 2006, six women who operated from under the Monte Christo Bridge, near Okahandja Park sought the assistance of

the Council of Churches Na-mibia (CCN) to leave behind their life as sex workers. Not long before their cry for help, a young woman also sought solace from the church. Recently widowed with two small boys, Esme Kisting

volunteered at the church when needed. Approached by the CCN for someone to conduct Bible study with the group, Pastor Kitching from the Pentecostal Protestant Church (PPC), recommended Esme meet with the women who had walked away from their past lives.

In the years to follow Esme would find much fulfil-ment and purpose in seeking

ways to assist the women in their new lives. Feeding their spirits strengthened the women to keep to their deci-sion, yet Esme soon realised practical assistance in the form of providing food packs were necessary. For was it not desperation to feed their children that drove many into the trade they now sought to get away from? Thus monthly food packs soon followed the

Thursday Bible study meet-ings. More than the food ca-tering for the immediate physi-cal needs, eighty percent of the members of what would become the King’s Daugh-ters support group, were HIV positive and therefore needed regular meals for their medica-tion to be effective.

Founded in 2006, King’s Daughters was registered in 2009 as the initial group of six

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soon grew bigger to include more women who would eventually branch off into vari-ous support groups consisting of older members supporting newer members.

Members of King’s Daugthers ascribe poverty, early school drop-out and teenage pregnancy as key factors that drove them to this avenue for survival. Research on sex work concur that childhood sexual and physi-cal abuse at home are often compounded by teenage pregnancy, poor education or lacking a job that pays a living wage are to lead women into the sex trade.

Support groups diversified when King’s Daughters began partnering with the Ministry of Health and Social Services, the University of Namibia and different organisations. Today members and their children benefit from health workers and social workers who do home visits, remind members to collect their medication and provide counselling to the women’s children.

King’s Daughters aims to assist women holistically in staying off the streets. They therefore see the importance of providing skills training to help women earn a living by different means. Alternative income generating projects include the management of a

bicycle workshop in Katutura under the Bicycle Empowerment Network in Namibia (BEN Namibia) where some of the women work refurbishing donated bicycles and selling them. Support groups and nutrition programmes for fami-lies with HIV benefit from the proceeds of such enterprises. Whereas some women have received training in bicycle refurbishment, other women received training in jewel-lery making and yet others have trained to be HIV Rapid Testers/ Community Health Counselors. With USAID fund-ing the former sex workers do HIV prevention work through peer-to-peer counselling with active sex workers in the ‘Red-light areas’ to educate them on taking better care of their health. Through Inter-personal Communication Sessions they also teach the women not to be afraid of stigma, but to go to clinics for regular testing or collecting of medication.

With this US funding Esme was joined by Eileen who came on as Project Coordinator of projects that catered for the children of the women. When children share a shack with a mother who falls back into sex work it can be very traumatising. Eileen works to see the youth receive counselling as well

as space at the Etegameno Resource Centre in Okuryan-gava for training and studying. In collaboration with Opera-tion Christmas Child Network, Eileen is working to grow a children’s arm for King’s Daughters.

The project expanded even further when King’s Daughters sought to assist women to kick their alcohol and drug abuse habit, which is a major debilitating factor that poses the threat of see-ing women return to their old lifestyle.

As one woman explained, “We can only do our job if we are intoxicated”. Not only did they find it difficult to work unless under the influence, men would sometimes give them alcohol and/ or drugs to use during their time togeth-er. Substance addiction was thus often part and parcel of their line of work. Further partnership with govern-ment meant that members of King’s Daughter could be treated for up to 5 weeks at the Etegameno Rehabilita-tion and Resource Centre in Brakwater, where they are attended to by psychologists and doctors to deal not only with their addiction but also the stigma and rejection they will have to face from espe-cially family or community members when they return home. Whilst at the rehabilita-tion centre King’s Daughters provides them with cosmet-ics as their families are either unwilling or unable to. For indeed, after the treatment they need to return to family circumstances where poverty and alcohol abuse are the order of the day.

While it has been called the world’s oldest profession, the reality of sex work is that it is the world’s oldest op-pression. Whereas the focus mostly centres on the women – or men – in this profession, it should not be forgotten that

there would be no scope for supply if there were no buy-ers. It is thus buyers, more than suppliers who keep the trade alive. Furthermore, given the extreme danger to women in this line of work, one needs to look at the social, political and economic factors that leave people desperate for survival at the expense of their own health and even their lives.

The path to becoming a sex worker is never dreamt of as becoming a teacher, DJ, barber, doctor or dancer is. According to Melissa Farley, prostitution is “the choice made by those who have no choice” (Yale Journal of Law and Feminism). It is for this reason that the economic and social infrastructure of com-munities should be addressed in political arenas. This would provide a structural means of fighting female exploitation because it is well docu-mented that women are more vulnerable to experience pov-erty, abuse and discrimination – especially in an environment of gender inequality.

Government and ordi-nary citizens are called upon to consider their role in the economic and social infra-structure that contributes to the choicelessness of the most vulnerable. As a society Namibians should strive to play their part in eradicating the powerlessness of their neighbour.

Organisations such as King’s Daughters should be saluted for the work they do to provide rehabilitation and empowerment services and care to women and their children. It is no wonder Esme was awarded the Trafficking in Person’s Hero’s Award in 2011 by the former US Secretary of State, Hil-lary Clinton, for her efforts in rehabilitating commercial sex workers and combating human trafficking.