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Dadine Chantale Dsandjon
24 years old
Assistant Executive Secretary, Reseau National des Associations des Tantines (RENATA)
Cameroun

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Dadine is the Assistant Executive Secretary of RENATA (Reseau National des Associations des Tantines, or "National Network of Aunties Association" in English), a network of more than 60 "Aunties" associations in Cameroun that bring comprehensive sexuality education to adolescents and teenage mothers.  Dadine is formally trained in the prevention of early and unwanted pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV/AIDS, and harmful traditional practices such as unsafe abortion. She joined Tantines as a young mother, and has since been a counsellor to numerous adolescents and teenage mothers. Dadine is currently pursuing a Psychology degree in Yaoundé, Cameroun. 

IWHC: Tell us the story of your life.

Dadine Dsandjon: My father has three wives and 26 children. I am the nineteenth child of my father, and the fifth child of my mother. I grew up with my entire family in Douala, where I attended primary school. When I was 11, my father lost his job and it became too expensive to live in the city. We moved to a village and I enrolled in secondary school.

But during my senior year of high school, when I was 17, I got pregnant by a boy at school.  My father was livid.  He had sent me to school so that I could have a future and get a good job.  I was the only one of nine daughters to reach senior year of high school. I could have gone on to college but instead I got pregnant, adding another mouth for my father to feed.
 
My father threatened to have the boy arrested, so the boy left the village and left me pregnant and alone. I did everything I could think of to end the pregnancy, but nothing worked.  At four months, I bought some local herbs and leaves from a traditional witch doctor that I had to insert into my vagina. It didn't end my pregnancy, and it scarred me. Then I worried that I harmed my unborn child and it would be born with developmental problems, but thank God he's fine. 
 
My father died three months after I got pregnant, so there was no one to look after my health. I rarely underwent any pre-natal consultations.  Mother made me stop school and start working in the fields with her, but a year after I gave birth, she agreed to take care of my son while I returned to school to repeat my senior year.  I worked very hard to get my degree.

During that time, a program called Tantines came to my area and administered a survey.  In Cameroun, "tantine" means a woman who counsels and keeps secrets.  The program adopted this name because they talk confidentially about sexuality with women and girls.  Because I was a teenage mother, Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Technische Zusammenarbiet (GZT)—the German organization that runs Tantines—asked me to join the program. I was trained in prevention of unwanted pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and HIV/AIDS.  I was also trained in hygiene and childcare. 

GTZ then established RENATA (Reseau National des Associations des Tantines), a network of more than sixty associations in eight provinces.  It was decided that four girls would represent the network from an office in Yaoundé.  Of the four positions, I was elected Assistant Executive Secretary (Adjoint) of RENATA.

IWHC: What is your first memory as a young girl or young woman of a situation where you were personally aware of or affected by gender inequalities or a lack of rights for girls and women?

DD: Traditionally, women take a lower place than men.  If a man is seated, the woman must sit in a chair lower than his. She can neither look at him nor speak to him except to say "yes, father, older brother, oldest brother," and so on. A husband has the right to call his wife by her name, but the wife doesn't have the same right.  She can only say "yes, my elder."

There are many restrictions as to what women can do. For example, there are certain foods that only men are allowed to eat. 

IWHC: How did the experience of growing up in Cameroun differ for girls and boys, both as young children and as teens? Did the activities/interests/and perceptions of the future differ for girls and boys?

DD: Boys didn't have any household chores, but girls always had to be in the home. We couldn't go out or do things we wanted. The boys were out playing while we were inside helping our mother with chores. If there were parties we were invited to, we weren't allowed to go, but the boys could go freely. When we complained, the mothers would say, "They are boys. And you are girls. You have to learn to be sweet for your future husbands."

It changed when I became a teenager. The boys were expected to do household chores. I had a little more freedom, because as my sisters and I got older, we started rebelling against the different treatment. We became really stubborn and headstrong. 

IWHC: Growing up, did you ever learn or talk about sex and reproductive health and rights?

DD: We never talked about these things, not even with our sisters. All our mothers told us was if you have your period, you could get pregnant. There were no details or information about how to protect ourselves from unwanted pregnancy. I have no idea what our parents thought about sex and reproductive health and rights because they never talked about it.

IWHC: What inspired you to work with Tantines?

DD: When you have a child as a teenager, you are often not respected by others in the community.  I had felt reduced to nothing—belittled—until I was introduced to Tantines.

I felt like I found someone I could confide in—someone who could identify with my problems and answer my questions about sexual and reproductive health. This made me want to be involved in the organization so that I could help others in the same way.

IWHC: How do you feel that Tantines has changed young people's lives, either in specific instances or in general?

DD: Personally, Tantines has had an enormously positive effect on my life. Today, I am an executive officer, and I have a salary. It's as if Tantines pulled me out of the dark and showed me the light.  I had been working in the fields, and now I am helping to manage an organization. 

Tantines works to make these changes in the lives of all of the girls involved with the organization.  It doesn't just give us sexuality education.  It encourages us to go back to school or, for those who don't have the resources to do this, it helps them get involved in income-generating activities so that they can become autonomous and don't have to depend on a man. 

IWHC: What do you see as major challenges facing young people in Cameroun today? What about greatest opportunities?

DD: A major challenge facing youth in Cameroun is accessing education. There are fees, often very high, to attend secondary school. This prevents many young people from enrolling, especially in the rural areas. 

In particular, young people need to be educated about their sexual rights. In Cameroun, the rights of young women are violated all the time.  Many women don't know that they have the right to decide with whom and when to have sexual relations.  A girl often feels obligated to have sex with whatever boy or man wants her.  In the rural areas where many people do not attend school, information on sexuality is even more essential because if girls aren't educated, they are even more easily manipulated. Boys also need access to information on sexual rights, so that they are taught that girls have the right to choose their partners.  Many men are equally ignorant.

Slowly, more young people are becoming vocal about their realities and needs. We are getting to a point where sexuality is no longer a taboo; we talk about sexuality in school and parents are also more willing to discuss it.

Also, opportunities for women are growing. More women are now in positions of power than ever before. Women are now company owners, in the military, and members of Parliament. 

IWHC: What do you think are some of the most important issues for programmers and policymakers to address in order to promote and protect the health and rights of young people—especially young girls?

DD: Maternal and infant mortality, as a result of early pregnancy in particular, must be addressed.  When an adolescent girl conceives, often her body is not developed enough to carry a child, let alone give birth. She is most likely abandoned by her partner, and often keeps her pregnancy a secret from her parents because she is afraid of being labeled by her family—and by society in general—as promiscuous, or even as a prostitute.  This means that she never seeks any medical care, and may therefore be at risk of infection or other complications. Her parents only find out about her pregnancy when she goes into labor, but they reject her and she is left to fend for herself and her baby.  As a result of these factors, we see more and more stories about newborns being abandoned by teenage mothers. 

Because they don't have any protection or support when they become pregnant, many young girls seek an abortion.  But because abortion isn't legal, many teenagers resort to unsafe abortion, which can severely harm both the woman and the unborn fetus. Abortion must be legal, so that women are not forced to jeopardize their health by giving birth when their bodies are too immature, or resort to unsafe abortion.  

Programmers and policymakers must also increase access to health services. Many pregnant women do not go to the hospital because they don't have the means to pay the hospital fees.  

IWHC: Do you have positive examples from your professional or personal experience in which both dialogue and programming have achieved meaningful youth participation or leadership?  What was effective about these particular examples?

DD: Tantines' trainings teach young people how to approach other young people and actively listen to them, as well as how to develop solutions to their problems.

I have many examples of how this approach has empowered young people by engaging them in dialogue about their rights. Back in my village, I used to do educational talks with young girls. Giving them the information they need about their rights and the importance of their problems was very empowering to them. 

IWHC: What are you proudest of?  

DD: My work with Tantines makes me feel valuable and useful in society.  It makes me happy when I walk down the street and I hear people calling my name. I'm proud when girls come up to me and thank me for the advice I have given them.

IWHC: What are your dreams for the future? Can you describe your vision of an ideal or better world?

DD: I hope to return to school and major in psychology at the university here in Yaoundé.  I want to continue in the same field of work (helping others through counseling), so I feel psychology is the best area of study for me.

For me, an ideal world is a just world—one of peace, where there are no inequalities, and where people are recognized for their merit and abilities, rather than for their personal contacts.

IWHC: How do you imagine your future?

DD: I would like to be the head of a nongovernmental organization (NGO), where I would work as a psychologist.  The NGO would work to protect and defend the rights of children, and promote their treatment and care.  I love children, and I would like to defend their interests.

IWHC: How did you first become acquainted with IWHC?

I first heard of IWHC through Femmes, Santé, et Développement en Afrique Sub-Saharienne (FESADE).  While I was working with RENATA, I had participated in a workshop on the FESADE curriculum. I was invited to a ceremony at FESADE – the graduation of their peer educators - where I heard a speaker thank IWHC.
I then looked IWHC up on the net, and applied to become a participant in the youth consultation that IWHC organized in Yaoundé. 


Page last updated 2/28/08.