God Save The Queen
Queen Elizabeth ll
'Not housekeepers any more': Somali women of the diaspora
Harun Hassan
7 November 2002
Harun Hassan worked for Associated Press and the BBC in Somalia. He currently works as a freelancer.
She dresses like Carol Vorderman, idolises Oprah Winfrey and, although she grew up in a male-dominated society where a man’s word is law, she likes to be seen as a feminist.
Following the collapse of her four-year marriage, Amina Shakur lives in temporary accommodation in west London with her two young children, Maymuun, five, and Mustaf, three. After a nightmare year in Russia, Finland and Norway, the 29-year-old refugee from Somalia arrived in the United Kingdom, her preferred destination, on March 1996. The main reason for her coming to the UK was to marry her long-term sweetheart, Mohamed Ali, who had arrived five months earlier.
A sumptuous Western-style Somali wedding in London
On 7 April 1996, four weeks after landing in the UK, they married in a small, colourful ceremony at which guests, friends and relatives were entertained by dancers and musicians.
‘We were both enthusiastic about the prospect of building a family,’ recalls Shakur. The future looked bright. They knew each other intimately, although the relationship between Muslims precludes sex before marriage. For Shakur was marrying a man she had met at high school, when she was 16 years old. She was in Form Three and he was in Form Four at the 21 October Secondary School in Somalia, named after the day dictator Mohamed Siyad Barre took power in 1969.
When Barre was toppled in January 1991, Shakur and Ali fled the country. They separated, and their only point of contact was through Shakur’s sister in London. They used to call her in order to keep in touch with each other. So marrying in London was special for Shakur and Ali. They were joining an estimated 100,000 Somalis living in the UK.
Things fall apart
It was after the birth of their first child that Shakur started feeling that things were not going according to plan, though Ali had no idea that anything was wrong. She admits that she had always wanted to rear her family in the European way. Like most Somali women in the UK, Shakur’s name is registered for state benefit and housing allowance. She wanted to study, to work if possible, to socialise and join in with the new culture. Ali, a devoutly religious man, felt differently. Like most other Somali men, he firmly believed that women should remain at home, provide meals and raise the children.
By July 2000, their relationship was damaged irreparably. After an argument over sharing the housework – a major point of contention between husbands and wives of the diaspora – Ali allegedly hit Shakur in the face. It was the third time he had physically assaulted her, and she wasted no time in dialling an emergency number.
Like many other Somali families with troubled relationships, divorce became the only solution. On the Christmas night of the same year, Ali officially pronounced the third and final procedure in Islamic law and divorced Shakur.
Somali marriage breakdowns first became frequent in the early 1990s when thousands of Somalis fled the civil strife and political upheaval in their country. Back in Somalia, the commitment to marriage was so strong that divorce was practically unheard of. But migrants to Europe found that the new culture meant that they faced rigorous challenges. Marriage became less valuable.
In a survey conducted for this article, 78 Somalis of different sexes and ages, both married and single, were asked to give their views on the main causes of marriage breakdowns within the UK’s Somali community.
Family counselling for the Somali community in London
The new culture was not supportive of traditional marriage customs, the interviewees felt. External cultural influences were the main reason given for marriage break-ups (76%). The rest of the interviewees (34%) blamed the economic independence of the diaspora women.
28% blamed khat, a green narcotic leaf widely chewed by the Somalis. Khat was illegal in Somalia from 1983 until 1991 when the regime that banned it was overthrown. In the UK, where it can be purchased legally, it is widely believed that the substance causes financial hardship and sexual impotence.
Interestingly, nearly half (46%) said Somali marriages in the diaspora were simply not strongly rooted in a committed relationship. When asked what the most common reasons for getting married were, 53% considered love as the starting point, while a staggering 44% said that Somalis in the diaspora married for financial reasons.
As to who was to blame, women or men, interviewees split on gender lines: 70% of the women blamed men’s failure to adapt to the new environment; 74% of the men blamed either the host culture, or the women for adapting to it.
Harun Hassan
7 November 2002
Harun Hassan worked for Associated Press and the BBC in Somalia. He currently works as a freelancer.
She dresses like Carol Vorderman, idolises Oprah Winfrey and, although she grew up in a male-dominated society where a man’s word is law, she likes to be seen as a feminist.
Following the collapse of her four-year marriage, Amina Shakur lives in temporary accommodation in west London with her two young children, Maymuun, five, and Mustaf, three. After a nightmare year in Russia, Finland and Norway, the 29-year-old refugee from Somalia arrived in the United Kingdom, her preferred destination, on March 1996. The main reason for her coming to the UK was to marry her long-term sweetheart, Mohamed Ali, who had arrived five months earlier.
A sumptuous Western-style Somali wedding in London
On 7 April 1996, four weeks after landing in the UK, they married in a small, colourful ceremony at which guests, friends and relatives were entertained by dancers and musicians.
‘We were both enthusiastic about the prospect of building a family,’ recalls Shakur. The future looked bright. They knew each other intimately, although the relationship between Muslims precludes sex before marriage. For Shakur was marrying a man she had met at high school, when she was 16 years old. She was in Form Three and he was in Form Four at the 21 October Secondary School in Somalia, named after the day dictator Mohamed Siyad Barre took power in 1969.
When Barre was toppled in January 1991, Shakur and Ali fled the country. They separated, and their only point of contact was through Shakur’s sister in London. They used to call her in order to keep in touch with each other. So marrying in London was special for Shakur and Ali. They were joining an estimated 100,000 Somalis living in the UK.
Things fall apart
It was after the birth of their first child that Shakur started feeling that things were not going according to plan, though Ali had no idea that anything was wrong. She admits that she had always wanted to rear her family in the European way. Like most Somali women in the UK, Shakur’s name is registered for state benefit and housing allowance. She wanted to study, to work if possible, to socialise and join in with the new culture. Ali, a devoutly religious man, felt differently. Like most other Somali men, he firmly believed that women should remain at home, provide meals and raise the children.
By July 2000, their relationship was damaged irreparably. After an argument over sharing the housework – a major point of contention between husbands and wives of the diaspora – Ali allegedly hit Shakur in the face. It was the third time he had physically assaulted her, and she wasted no time in dialling an emergency number.
Like many other Somali families with troubled relationships, divorce became the only solution. On the Christmas night of the same year, Ali officially pronounced the third and final procedure in Islamic law and divorced Shakur.
Somali marriage breakdowns first became frequent in the early 1990s when thousands of Somalis fled the civil strife and political upheaval in their country. Back in Somalia, the commitment to marriage was so strong that divorce was practically unheard of. But migrants to Europe found that the new culture meant that they faced rigorous challenges. Marriage became less valuable.
In a survey conducted for this article, 78 Somalis of different sexes and ages, both married and single, were asked to give their views on the main causes of marriage breakdowns within the UK’s Somali community.
Family counselling for the Somali community in London
The new culture was not supportive of traditional marriage customs, the interviewees felt. External cultural influences were the main reason given for marriage break-ups (76%). The rest of the interviewees (34%) blamed the economic independence of the diaspora women.
28% blamed khat, a green narcotic leaf widely chewed by the Somalis. Khat was illegal in Somalia from 1983 until 1991 when the regime that banned it was overthrown. In the UK, where it can be purchased legally, it is widely believed that the substance causes financial hardship and sexual impotence.
Interestingly, nearly half (46%) said Somali marriages in the diaspora were simply not strongly rooted in a committed relationship. When asked what the most common reasons for getting married were, 53% considered love as the starting point, while a staggering 44% said that Somalis in the diaspora married for financial reasons.
As to who was to blame, women or men, interviewees split on gender lines: 70% of the women blamed men’s failure to adapt to the new environment; 74% of the men blamed either the host culture, or the women for adapting to it.
