On the occasion of Women’s Day, we pay tribute to, and recognise African women who contributed significantly to social work and those of you who continue to do so today. Some of these women are covered below.

Charlotte Makgomo-Mannya Maxeke (1871-1939)

Mama Maxeke was born in 1871 (other sources say 1874) in Ramokgopa, Polokwane District (then Pietersburg District), Limpopo Province, South Africa. At this point there was no formal social work training. Those who practiced ‘social work’ at this time were either educated in other disciplines or had skills in welfare, management or church or political work.  She was the first welfare worker or ‘social worker’ in South Africa, was ‘a campaigner for women’s  and  workers’  rights,  she was a ‘native  welfare  officer’  or parole officer for juvenile delinquents at the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Courts (Smith, 2021, p. 165). Although she did not have a social work qualification, Charlotte is regarded as the first South African social worker, just like many people who founded social work in other parts of the world without social work qualifications. Her father was John Kgope Mannya, his grandfather was headman Modidima Mannya of the Batlokwa people, under Chief Mamafa Ramokgopa. She obtained a degree in 1901 (others say 1902 or 3) from University of Wilberforce in the USA, becoming the first black South African to do so. At that time, pan-Africanist William Edward Burghardt Du Bois was a lecturer at the same university. She organised women to protest segregation laws, including the infamous pass laws. She wrote about social injustices in isiXhosa. In 1918 she founded the Bantu Women’s League (BWL) which later became the African National Congress Women’s League. Together with 700 other women, Maxeke marched to the Bloemfontein City Council and burned their passes there. Her husband Marshall Maxeke, was also politically active and they worked together. She has been honoured by having roads  and buildings named after her, and an annual lecture hosted by the ANC, a part he contributed to.

Regina Gelana Twala (1908-1968)

A social worker, anthropological researcher, writer, activist and feminist in South Africa and Eswatini.

In 1948, she became one of two women to get a social science degree from University of the Witwatersrand. Under apartheid, many of her several manuscripts were deemed unfit for publication. In 1913, the white repressive rulers of South Africa passed the Native Land Act, shared land of black people and moved black people to crowded urban villages. This is what Gelana, her family and community experienced when she was 30 years old – they were moved from rural Natal to Johannesburg. She later studied social work at the Jan Hofmeyr School of Social Work, where Minnie Mandela and Joshua Nkomo studied. After finishing the program, she could not find a job, and ended up as a domestic worker at a home of white people. This shows the inappropriateness of western styled social work education in Africa. As an activist, she was jailed in 1952 after taking part in the popular Defiance Campaign against colonisation. She did more activism in Eswatini where his husband came from. Her research work on women and African society was remarkable but was not recognised, in fact, the white researchers she worked with got awards because of her work. A key pillar of her research was her refusal that researchers anthropologist Hilda Kuper, who was white, owned ‘research sites and research subjects.’ For her, this was absurd. Another white researcher, an anthropologist from Sweden, had Mrs Twala do research and got all the credit. Kuper is known in the western world for that research, but Mrs Twala is not known at home and abroad.

Mai Musodzi Chibhaga Ayema (1885-1952)

Mai Musodzi Chibhaga Ayema (1885-1952) – the ‘mother of Zimbabwean social services’ and a pioneer of women’s rights.

She  was the mother and one of the founders of Zimbabwean social services although she did not have a social work qualification. Together with her siblings, they became orphans after Chimurenga 1 of 1896, a war to repel colonialists led by the British South Africa (BSA) Company, the same war that resulted in Mbuya Nehanda (her aunt), Sekuru Kaguvi and other leaders being hanged by the white colonialists. Mai founded Harare African Women’s Club in 1938. She served Native Advisory Board and the National Welfare Society’s African committee where she advocated for rights of black people. Mbare, Zimbabwe’s oldest suburb for Black people, has a Recreation Hall renamed Mai Musodzi Hall in her honour. In 2008, a book titled Elizabeth Musodzi and the Birth of African Feminism in Early Colonial Africa was published by historian Tsuneo Yoshikuni. Like Jairosi Jiri, she became a social reformer, do-gooder and philanthropist of good standing of her era. The famous street in Mbare, Ayema, was named after the Ayema family.

Priscilla Ingasiani Abwao (1924 – November 13, 2009)

She was a Kenyan social worker and advocate for women’s rights, freedom fighter, and the first African woman to serve on the Legislative Council in 1961 in Kenya. Even before independence, Priscilla Abwao was instrumental on the fight for equal rights between women and men. At a women’s conference she organised in 1962, she said “It is not time to sit and gossip. We have to work and build,” she said.. A suffragette is a woman seeking the right to vote through organised protest. Abwao died on November 13, 2009 at the age of 85.

Winnie Madikizela-Mandela 1936–2016

She trained at the Jan Hofmeyr School of Social Work beginning 1953 and finishing in 1955. This was the same college attended by Regina Gelana Twala and Joshua Nkomo in Johannesburg.

She worked at Baragwanath Hospital after refusing a scholarship to go to the USA. She became more interested in social justice activism and research in infant mortality and other topics among Black people. One of her major research findings was that high infant mortality rate among townshop dwellers, it was 10 deaths in every 1,000 births. After marrying Madiba Nelson Mandela in 1958, she continued her political activism, resulting in her being restricted and monitored, her home being raided and her being jailed. In 1990, Winnie was appointed African National Congress’s the head of social welfare. She was also interested in HIV/AIDS and land repossession. She died in 2018. In 2019, the University of South Africa posthumously  honoured her with a doctorate in social work for contributing to social work with individuals, groups and communities in South Africa. The house from which Winnie used to provided social work services from has now been turned into a museum.

Aïcha Chenna (August 14, 1941 – September 25, 2022)

She was a Moroccan social worker, nurse, women’s rights advocate and activist who worked with disadvantaged women and founded the Association Solidarité Féminine (ASF) in 1985, Casablanca. before then, she volonuteered in child welfare. The charity assists single mothers and victims of abuse. Chenna received various humanitarian awards for her work, including the 2009 Opus Prize (worth US$1 million). In 1996, Chenna published Miséria: témoignage (Misery: Testimonies), in which she narrated twenty stories of women she had worked with. The book has been described both as a “feminist proclamation” and a “miscellany of sorrowful stories”. Chenna self-described as having “a Muslim heart with a secular mind”. During her time as an employee of the Ministry of Health, she became known for her work in areas subject to social and religious taboos, including family planning, single mothers’ status, illegitimate children and abandoned children, and the status of incest victims. She regularly received criticism from social conservatives, who said that her work legitimised immoral behaviour. Chenna died on September 25, 2022, at a hospital in Casablanca. She was 81. She worked at Baragwanath Hospital after refusing a scholarship to go to the USA. She became more interested in social justice activism and research in infant mortality and other topics among Black people. One of her major research findings was that high infant mortality rate among townshop dwellers, it was 10 deaths in every 1,000 births. After marrying Madiba Nelson Mandela in 1958, she continued her political activism, resulting in her being restricted and monitored, her home being raided and her being jailed. In 1990, Winnie was appointed African National Congress’s the head of social welfare. She was also interested in HIV/AIDS and land repossession. She died in 2018. In 2019, the University of South Africa posthumously  honoured her with a doctorate in social work for contributing to social work with individuals, groups and communities in South Africa.

Jember Teferra (May 21, 1943 – January 10, 2021)

Jember Teferra was an Ethiopian nurse, development worker, and anti-poverty campaigner. She devoted to efforts to combat poverty and poor health in Addis Ababa. In 1969, she became health education and social services coordinator for the Red Cross in Ethiopia. In 1976 Jember herself was jailed as a result of her social activism. When she was released in 1981, Jember continued to work to alleviate poverty, initially with Save the Children, then setting up and running the Integrated Holistic Approach-Urban Development Project, a scheme that eventually improved housing, health, education and employment opportunities for more than 50,000 people in the slums of Addis Ababa. Her work received international recognition and funding, and the project still operates today.

Mitri Widad (1927-2007)

She was an Egyptian nationalist, leftist, social worker, teacher, and activist for women’s rights. She became a prominent figure in the nationalist leftist movement and the women’s peace movement to end the British occupation. In her later years she continued to be a member of the Women’s Committee of the Arab Lawyers Federation, the Afro-Asian Solidarity Organisation, and the Association of Cairo University Women Graduates. She represented Egyptian women during the 1986 Nairobi Conference on Women, and visited Palestinian camps under siege in solidarity with the Palestinian people.

Victoria Fikile Chitepo (March 27, 1928 – April 8, 2016)

She was born as Victoria Mahamba-Sithole in the South African coal-mining town of Dundee in KwaZulu-Natal. She was educated in South Africa and attended the University of Natal, where she was awarded a B.A. degree, and took a postgraduate degree in education at the University of Birmingham in the UK. She met her future husband, Herbert, at Adams College near Durban in South Africa. In Zimbabwe, she campaigned for women’s rights and rights of Africans in general. She went with her husband to Tanganyika (now Tanzania) and worked as a social worker aiding black Rhodesian refugees in Dar es Salaam for three years, between 1966 and 1968. In 1975. Herbert Chitepo, her husband was leader of the liberation movement in Zimbabwe but was later assassinated in Lusaka, Zambia by agents of the Rhodesian government. She later worked in government until her death on April 8, 2016.

Mame Seck Mbacké (October 1947 – December 24, 2018)

She was a Senegalese writer, and founder of publishing house Éditions Sembene. She wrote in French and in Wolof. She was born in Gossas. Mbacké studied Social and Economic Development at the Institute of Higher International Studies in Paris. She worked as a diplomat in France and Morocco, then as a social worker at the Senegalese consulate in Paris. In Paris, she completed an International Relations degree at the Sorbonne and post-graduate studies in public health and nutrition at the Pantheon-Sorbonne University. She later worked for the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Dakar. Her short story “Mame Touba” was included in the anthology Anthologie de la Nouvelle Sénégalaise (1970–1977). In 1999, she received the Premier Prix de Poésie from the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Senegal. Mbacké established the publishing house Éditions Sembene in 2006.

Some Lessons From These Biographies

• African social workers were not recognised in western social work training. In the syllabus, western social workers are all over the history of social work, but these great women are not there. These are people who should form the history and basis of African social work.
• In research, we learn that researchers don’t own communities or participants. Research should be collaborative. This was Mrs Twala’s message several years ago.
• African women played a huge role in the initial days of social work in Africa and they continue doing so today.
• Western literature that found its way in African social work was at the expense of African literature. While the work of Africans was being hidden, social work literature from the west was being shipped to Africa. Decolonisation means doing away with colonial literature and revaluing African literature.
• gender issues have always been important in African social work.
• Political activism, advocacy and writing are key components of African social work.

Acknowledgements: Some information presented in this blog came from The Wall Of Great Africans