Ndiilokelwa Nthengwe
A lot of us do not understand intersecting oppressions and therefore reason as if structural oppression occurs in isolation; as long as we experience some form of privilege, we disregard the oppression of individuals who may be facing multiple forms of layered violence. (Black) men may understand the oppressions of racism and institutionalised racism, but very quickly abandon this lens of dissecting racist oppression when confronted with gender privilege. The case for reproductive justice is not any different, because whilst we recognise that access to a safe, on demand and legal abortion is a right which is restricted in Namibia, housing insecurity and shacks undermine this right much more than we would like to admit.
To recap on the meaning of reproductive justice, it is worth revisiting the expanded definition to remain contextual and current with the discourse on access to safe, on demand and legal abortions. According to the Asian Communities for Reproductive Justice (ACRJ), reproductive justice is, “... the complete physical, mental, spiritual, political, economic, and social well-being of women and girls, and will be achieved when women and girls have the economic, social and political power and resources to make healthy decisions about our bodies, sexuality and reproduction for ourselves, our families and our communities in all areas of our lives.”
To deconstruct the above, it merely states that it is imperative that we conduct a holistic and comprehensive analysis on the extent to which the current archaic abortion law undermines reproductive justice, but that we do not do so in isolation of so many structural and intersecting oppressions under which reproductive justice is also compounded. In a human rights analysis excerpt, further insight is provided on this stark but incontrovertible link, “The three core principles of reproductive justice are simple: People have the right to have a child. People have a right not to have a child. And people have a right to parent their children in safe and healthy environments. But how can a person parent their children in a safe and healthy environment if they don’t have stable housing? And how can a person who finds themselves pregnant think about carrying that pregnancy to term if they are already housing insecure and likely to find themselves homeless or plunged into poverty with the added expense of a new baby?”
The above excerpt should immediately propel us to think about access to housing and housing rights in Namibia, whilst still grappling with a law which imposes its own status of an individual’s reproductive autonomy onto them. It succinctly summarises but also reasonably argues the point that, if women, sexual gender and sex minorities already do not have the freedom and the financial wherewithal to make an informed choice about their reproductive destiny amidst housing insecurity or in extreme cases, homelessness, then, in fact, government has failed dismally not only to safeguard the right to privacy and the right to reproductive choice (as the Abortion and Sterilization Act No.2 of 1975 is undoubtedly invasive and is a clear imposition into pregnancy) but that the government has also failed to safeguard the right to dignity which is undergirded by access to housing and housing security.
An article published in New Era almost four years ago revealed that access to housing remains a serious and consistent structural barrier and undignifying ordeal. “According to the latest updated statistics, there are 308 informal settlements in Namibia with a staggering 228 000 shacks accommodating about 995 000 people in urban areas. This means close to 40% of the population are now living in shacks in urban areas, predominantly in Windhoek. Monthly income of households in informal settlements are below N$3 000 and average N$1 500.” Even more, an article published in the Erongo News two years ago reported, “Another tragedy struck Walvis Bay when an estimated 150 shacks burned to the ground in the Twaloloka informal settlement in Kuisebmond. More than 1000 residents were left homeless by the devastating fire.”
While there may not have been a clear link between housing and reproductive justice, the link has been veritably established in the analysis above; in how reproductive justice addresses intersecting oppressions, analyses power systems and in how shacks fall under the gambit of intersecting oppressions which undermines our ability to ‘parent children in a healthy and safe environment’. This is not necessarily a chicken and egg proposition to determine whether or not housing should be provided first before the abortion law is repealed, because the restrictive apartheid abortion law is already 47 years old and nearly half our population reside in shacks 30 years into independence. This is instead a logical indication that the law on abortion must therefore be repealed because if a significant amount of our population already cannot afford access to decent and dignified housing, then a law which virtually forces us to reproduce only exacerbates our economic and material conditions further, let alone housing insecurity.
If women, sexual, gender and sex minorities cannot raise our children in healthy and safe environments, then a law which limits options for reproductive autonomy is clearly economically costly, redundant and is complicit in the ongoing intersectional violence and structural oppression which characterise our daily lives.