23

October 2, 2018 www.mygov.go.ke NEWSFOCUS | 23 For this Harvard alumna, striking first is a given To say Julia Ojiambo is a woman of firsts would be putting it mildly. Not only was she the first African woman to join the University of Nairobi, she was also the first African woman to be enrolled at the prestigious Harvard University and the first woman to be appointed assistant minister in Kenya. In 2003, she was awarded the Moran of the Burning Spear (MBS) in recognition of her contribution towards empowering women and children. Her story is excerpted from a forthcoming book, Pioneers &Transformers: The Journeys of Top Achieving Women in Kenya, published by the Kenya Yearbook Editorial Board Pioneers & Transformers Journeys of top achieving women in Kenya BY KYEB T he petite frame of Kenya’s first woman assistant minister belies her gargantuan stature in academics and politics. The sixth child of pioneering western Kenya Anglican clergyman Rev Saulo Okelo Majale and evangelist Tesera Were, Professor Julia Auma Ojiambo’s middle name might as well have been ‘Number One’. Ojiambo was in the first class of eight girls at the African Girls’ High School (today’s Alliance Girls’ High School). She was also the first Kenyan woman to study at the prestigious Harvard University in the United States, and the first female lecturer and first woman PhD holder at the University of Nairobi (UoN). Ojiambo was also Kenya’s first woman assistant minister at just 38 years. She credits her siblings for who she is. She regards her eldest sister, Ruth Auma Vuyiya, the first woman superintendent of Kenya Prisons, as her role model, and her brother, David Majale, as “exemplary”. She describes her other sisters, Esther, Priscilla and Rose, as “accomplished teachers”. With only Perpetua and Edward born after her, she says she really had no playmates after the eighth-born, Agnes, died aged three years. Ojiambo wanted to be like Ruth, the perfectionist, David, the hands-on man, and her “outgoing and powerful” mother, Tesera, who “brought practically everybody home – from battered women to the disabled”. Home was a beehive of activity; it was where the church choir practised, pre-school children played and young people did sports. “We grew cotton to raise money for our school fees,” says Ojiambo who, at five, was already tilling the land to help her father. In her spare time, she wrote in the soil with her finger or scribbled with charcoal on the walls. Her keenness to learn and above-average intelligence saw her skip two lower primary classes to catch up with Rose, the fifth child. She excelled in her primary school examinations to clinch a place as a pioneer at Alliance Girls’ alongside seven other girls seJULIA’S TIMELINE 1968 1974 1976 lected nationally. She recalls her time at Alliance fondly. “We were like precious gold; we were like the torch on a hill. We were brilliant and everyone knew about us. We were the crème de la crème of the nation.” Her time at Alliance coincided with the politicallyvolatile state of emergency. In Form Two, they had to be spirited away to Machakos Hills under the cover of darkness to escape raids from Mau Mau freedom fighters. They only returned to prepare for their Kenya Junior Secondary Education exams. After Form Four, she was sent to work at Vihiga Women Teachers Training College, although she was untrained. She was later posted to Friends School Kamusinga in today’s Bungoma County. In 1956, she became the first African woman to join UoN, then known as the Royal Technical College, to study Domestic Science. She married Hillary Ojiambo in 1961, and joined him in Kampala, Uganda, where he was a medical registrar at Mulago Hospital. She worked as the Makerere University guesthouse manager and as a research assistant at the hospital’s infant nutrition unit. Kwashiorkor (protein deficiency) and marasmus (under-nourishment) were widespread in East Africa at the time, causing many deaths among children aged under five years. Ojiambo joined two paediatricians to develop a high-protein biscuit that was used to treat the two disorders. In 1962, her husband was Applied and gained admission to the Harvard School of Public Health in 1968, becoming the first African woman at the prestigious institution. Vied for the Busia Central parliamentary seat. She managed to trounce the incumbent, Arthur Ochwada, in a rough campaign that saw her husband slashed on the head with machetes and left for dead. awarded a Commonwealth scholarship for post-graduate studies in medicine at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. Coincidentally, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations and the United Nations Children’s Fund awarded her a fellowship to study Community Nutrition at the University of London in the same year. Until then, the United KingRe-launched the Labour Party of Kenya as a political platform together with politician Ababu Namwamba and journalist David Makali, and served as the chairperson. dom allowed only women accompanying their husbands to take short courses. Even then, her studies were only possible because Minister for Health David Otiende prevailed on the Ministry of Education ministry. “He signed my paWORDS OF WISDOM • Do things you like without being pushed and be at peace with your life • Set your goals and follow them through to succeed in life.” • Don’t be afraid to consult about what works and what doesn’t • Life is dynamic. Sometimes the environment can frustrate the achievement of your initial vision but don’t lose hope; look for an alternative pers of release, arguing that Kenya was building its manpower.” In England, Ojiambo worked hard and passed her exams after taking parallel courses at the University of London’s Queen Elizabeth College. She enrolled for a Bachelor’s degree in Nutrition and studied with pre-clinical medical students as well as post-graduate nurses. As she wound up her studies, the Ministry of Education and the Royal Technical College (UoN) came knocking. They offered her an assistant lecturer’s job in Home Science in the Faculty of Education. During this time, she became the first African woman warden of the Women’s Halls of Residence at a time when most students were either Europeans or Asians. Ojiambo taught Home Management and Nutrition, key subjects at a time when goitre was prevalent. However, promoting iodised salt was tough amid rumours that the micro-nutrient caused infertility. She also researched on anaemia among pre-school children in Karai, Kiambu, which led to a school-feeding programme. She later applied and gained admission to the Harvard School of Public Health in 1968, becoming the first African woman at the prestigious institution. She had won a World Health Organization (WHO) fellowship to facilitate her studies at Harvard. It covered all her needs, including laboratory fees, housing and clothing, over and above a Kenya Government education loan, which her mentor, Dr Gikonyo Kiano, guaranteed. As fate would have it, her husband secured another Commonwealth fellowship for post-doctoral research studies at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. She had three children at the time – Josephine, Tess and Jack, who was only three weeks old when they left for the US. “People thought I was crazy, but I was determined and focused,” she says. She was allowed to take a househelp, Beatrice, whom she describes as “our mother who made sure everything was in order,” she recalls.

24 Publizr Home