Vol. 76/No. 11      March 19, 2012

Below is an excerpt from Women’s Liberation and the African Freedom Struggle by Thomas Sankara, the central leader of the popular uprising in Upper Volta on Aug. 4, 1983, that ushered in one of the deepest revolutions in African history. Sankara, who became president of what was renamed Burkina Faso, was murdered in a counterrevolutionary coup in 1987 that destroyed the revolutionary government. This excerpt is from a speech Sankara delivered on March 8, 1987, commemorating International Women’s Day. Copyright © 1990 by Pathfinder Press. Reprinted by permission.

BY THOMAS SANKARA  
[O]ne single night placed women at the heart of the family’s development and at the center of national solidarity. The dawn that followed the night of August 4, 1983, brought liberty with it, calling all of us to march together side by side in equality, as a single people joined by solidarity in common goals. The August revolution found the Burkinabè woman in her state of subjugation, exploited by a neocolonial society deeply imbued with the ideology of backward social forces. The revolution owed it to itself to break with the reactionary policies on women’s emancipation that had been advocated and followed up to then, by clearly defining new, just, and revolutionary policies.

On October 2, 1983, in the Political Orientation Speech, the National Council of the Revolution clearly laid out the main axis of the fight for women’s liberation. It made a commitment to work to mobilize, organize, and unify all the active forces of the nation, particularly women.

The Political Orientation Speech had this to say specifically in regard to women: “They will be involved in all the battles we will have to wage against the various shackles of neocolonial society in order to build a new society. They will be involved—at all levels in conceiving projects, making decisions, and implementing them—in organizing the life of the nation as a whole. The final goal of this great undertaking is to build a free and prosperous society in which women will be equal to men in all spheres.”

There can be no clearer way to conceive of and explain the question of women and the liberation struggle ahead of us. “The genuine emancipation of women is one that entrusts responsibilities to women, that involves them in productive activity and in the different fights the people face. The genuine emancipation of women is one that compels men to give their respect and consideration.”

What is clearly indicated here, comrade militants, is that the struggle to liberate women is above all your struggle to deepen our democratic and popular revolution, a revolution that grants you from now on the right to speak and act in building a society of justice and equality, in which men and women have the same rights and responsibilities. The democratic and popular revolution has created the conditions for such a fight. It now falls to you to act with the greatest sense of responsibility in breaking through all the chains and shackles that enslave women in backward societies like ours and to assume your share of the responsibilities in the political fight to build a new society at the service of Africa and at the service of all humanity.

In the very first hours of the democratic and popular revolution we said, “Emancipation, like freedom, is not granted, it is conquered. It is for women themselves to put forward their demands and mobilize to win them.” In this way, our revolution has not only laid out the goal to be attained in the struggle for women’s liberation but has also indicated the road to follow and the methods to use, as well as the main protagonists of this battle.

We have now been working together, men and women, for four years in order to achieve success and come closer to our final goal. We should be conscious of the battles that have been waged, the successes that have been achieved, the setbacks that have been suffered, and the difficulties that have been encountered. This will aid us in further preparing and leading future struggles.

What work has the democratic and popular revolution accomplished with respect to women’s emancipation? What are the strong points, the weak points?

One of the main gains of our revolution in the struggle for women’s emancipation has been, without doubt, the establishment of the Women’s Union of Burkina [UFB]. The creation of this organization constitutes a major gain because it has given the women of our country a framework and sound tools for waging a successful fight. The creation of the UFB represents a big victory because it makes possible mobilizing all women militants around well-defined and just goals in the fight for liberation, under the leadership of the National Council of the Revolution.

The UFB is the organization of militant and serious women who are determined to work for change, to fight to win, to fall down repeatedly, but to get back on their feet each time and go forward without retreating. This is the new consciousness that has taken root among the women of Burkina, and we should all be proud of it. Comrade militants, the Women’s Union of Burkina is your combat organization. It’s up to you to sharpen it further so its blade will cut more deeply, bringing you more and more victories.

The different initiatives for women’s emancipation that the government has been able to take over a little more than three years are certainly insufficient. But they have made it possible to take some steps, to the point where our country can today present itself as being in the vanguard of the battle to liberate women. …

Though the August revolution has undoubtedly done much for the emancipation of women, this is still far from adequate. Much remains for us to do. To better appreciate what remains to be done, we must be more aware of the difficulties still to be overcome. There are many obstacles and difficulties. At the top of the list are the problems of illiteracy and low political consciousness—both of which are intensified by the inordinate influence that reactionary forces exert in backward societies like ours. We must work with perseverance to overcome these two main obstacles.  
 
 
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