IT’S a sweltering Wednesday afternoon in the mountainous town of Chimanimani. Everyone appears to be minding their business at a mobile equipment workshop located in the eastern parts of the administrative offices of a mining company.
It has been two days since the town received its last rains but the fields are teeming with a good maize crop which is almost ready for harvest.
As one approaches the workshop, one thing catches the attention: A broken-down Bell dozer which appears to have seen its best days.
The sound of spanners, bolts and nuts is more audible as one gets closer to the dozer. Ordinarily, the assumption would be that the old horse was being stripped for spares. That was not the case.
A middle-aged woman has her eyes transfixed on the spaghetti-like cables running on the heavy-duty machinery.
Meet Tessa Dzvuke an auto electrician stationed at the Zimbabwe Consolidated Diamond Company Chimanimani (ZCDC) Mine, commonly referred to by employees as Portal E. She says being the only female in her section does not intimidate her.
Dzvuke never dreamt of becoming a professional in the automotive industry. Through socialisation during her childhood days, she dreamt of taking care of the sick. That dream changed when she stumbled upon a newspaper advert while herding cattle in her rural home.
“I never dreamt of becoming a mechanic. I wanted to be a nurse. That is the profession that I wanted. I wrote many applications to nurse training institutions but I never got a response,” she said this with a smile and she reminisced about her career path.
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“So one day, I was at my rural home herding cattle and then my father brought a copy of The Sunday Mail. I started reading the paper while herding cattle and then I saw an advert posted by the Harare Institute of Technology and I securely kept a page of this advert. When I got back home late, I asked my father what an auto electrician was and he explained to me what the profession entails.
“After he explained to me, I told him that I wanted to be one. He said that was okay with him and he promised to hand deliver my application to the institution. After two weeks he came back and told me that we will travel back to Harare after I was invited for an interview. I went for an interview and I was successful in that interview and I was enrolled for the programme.”
Giving up her childhood dream of becoming a nurse for a more technical male-dominated profession was never a stroll in the park for the young rural girl.
“I was very poor in Technical Drawing when I went to college but I was one of the best Engineering Mathematics students at Harare Institute of Technology,” she reflected.
“Technical Drawing was something else for me but engineering science, technology and other subjects were just a walkover.”
As she got a grip of the technical aspects of her new profession, industrial attachment was to prepare her for more challenges in future. To gain the much-needed important professional lessons on safety, bloopers and blunders had to happen.
“You know, when you leave college for industrial attachment, all you know is theory and less practical experience and this is often done through short demonstrations due to limited resources,” she said.
“Before I went to the Zimbabwe Republic Police for attachment, I went to ZUPCO, there was a manager of mixed race who was in charge of that depot,” she said.
“One day, I was asked to install a battery on one of the DAF buses. As a college student, I was inexperienced but I was told to fit in the battery by my supervisors. I short-circuited my connections and the battery blew and the acid splashed on my face. The manager who had an office overlooking the workshop came downstairs fuming but when he realised that I had made that costly error on a new battery he calmed down because I was an attaché. From then onwards, I started appreciating safety precautions.”
Breaking the gender barriers
For Dzvuke, having the right attitude and skills is all she needs to work with her male counterparts.
“I believe that I have the required experience and competent enough to do my job. In fact, if you come back after two days, you will find this dozer that has been idle up and running, contributing towards production of diamonds at the mine, she confidently said.
“Knowing that I had a hand in the production of diamonds through my skills and bringing back to life non-functional equipment is something that gratifies me.”
Notwithstanding her positive energy, Dzvuke is not oblivious to her weaknesses.
“I do not pretend to be a man and I know where I lack. Through teamwork, my male colleagues often give me a hand in cases where I have to lift and fix heavy components such as the starter for this dozer that I am fixing,” she said.
“They recognise my capabilities and we share mutual respect among ourselves and that makes the job more enjoyable and worth the while. To my sisters out there, my advice is, believe in yourself. There is no profession that men can do that women cannot do.”
Dzvuke prides herself in being the only woman working in the ZCDC mobile equipment workshop in Chimanimani after having worked at the company’s Chiadzwa Mine before her posting to Chimanimani.
The month of March is being recognised as International Women’s Month. Despite many strides made in bridging gender roles, the issue of equality continues to be a challenge in many parts of the world.
Sugar Chagonda, ZCDC corporate affairs executive, said the company’s recruitment policy was anchored on gender mainstreaming.
“As ZCDC, we are an equal opportunity employer and we are proud that is reflected on our board of directors composition right through to the shop floor worker,” Chagonda said.
“We have ISO-certified policies that promote gender equality, shun sexual harassment and, above all, ensure that we have safe workplaces regardless of gender, race or religion. Let me also take this opportunity to inform you that this month we will be sharing posts of eminent women within the ZCDC family on our social media platforms as we recognise and celebrate our own.”
According to the United Nations, the rights, needs and aspirations of girls and women were not historically included in global development agendas. That has changed in the past 50 years.
The Millennium Development Goals launched in 2000 and the Sustainable Development Goals SDGs), in 2015, introduced frameworks with specific goals and targets on girls' and women’s rights, opportunities and well-being. UN SDG 9 seeks to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls and this includes nine targets that fight against gender discrimination, violence, and forced marriages while ensuring access to healthcare and economic resources, among others.
Official figures from the UN show that about one in four girls continue to be married off as children and at the current rate, it will take
137 years to lift all girls and women out of poverty.
