Assignment

I born on April 1, 1940, Nigeria, Kenya, environmental activist grew up In a small village. my father supported the family
working as a tenant farmer. At this times, Kenya was still a British colony. My home life was very much like other Kenyans in
many ways. I came from here farming family, and as I remarked to Judith stone of O magazine, My parents taught me to
“respect the soil and its bounty”. ‘’I grew up close to my mother,’’I further explain to stone,’’in the field, where I could
observe mature.’’

My father was considered the head of the house; my mother had very little power and Performed
traditionally ‘’ women's tasks’’ such as fetching water and gathering firewood. In particular, education
for women and girls was not values, or even encourages. But I was extremely bright, and my older
brother persuaded my parents to send me to school. My family decided to send me to school, which
was uncommon for girls at that times. I started at a local primary school when I was 8 years old from
here on, I departed from the usual path of Kenyan girlhood. I left my village to be educated in
boarding schools run by Catholic missionaries.

An excellent student, I was able to continue my education at the Loreto girls' High school. I won a
scholarship in 1960 to go to College in United States. Attended mount St. Scholastica College in
Atchison, Kansas, where I earned Bachelor’s degree in biology in 1964. 2 years later I completed a
masters degree in biological sciences at university of Pittsburgh. I would later draw inspiration by the
civil rights and anti Vietnam wars movements in United States. Watching the Americans express
themselves made me realize that people had a right to speak out for what they believe in.

Returning to Kenya, I studied veterinary anatomy at university of Nairobi. I made history in 1971,
becoming the first woman in East Africa to earn a doctorate degree. I joined the university’s faculty
and became the first woman to change a university department in the region in 1976.
During the early 1970s the fledging instructor married and had 3 children. My husband, Mwangi
Mathaai, Vashi politician who divorced his wife in the mid 1980s.

Regarding my marriage I says, ’’Nobody told me that Manu would be threatened by the High academic
achievements of women like me it was an unspoken problem that I and not my husband had a PhD
and the thought in the university’’. In the divorce trial, my husband tells the court that I was ‘’too
educated, too strong, too successful, too stubborn, and too hard to control.’’ But what was difficult for
me to understand was the criticism but other woman from the ruling party who denounced me as a
violator of African tradition for refusing to be Submissive.Being a woman with confidence
outspokenness and uprightness, I joined the National Council of women Kenya, an NGO whose focus
was to educate women while advocating for their rights. Because of my engagement in a variety of
progressive political causes, I increasingly found myself the target of harassment by the then Kenyan
president Daniel arap Moi’s brutal regime. Throughout the 1990s I was arrested, imprisoned, and
intimidated time and again for speaking out against the Moi administration. I remind undaunted,
however, and even made several attempts to run for public office. Later, in the first free
and democratic elections held in nearly 25 years, Kenyan citizens voted in a new
administration, with Mwaikibaki Serving as president. During the same elections I want
your seat in the National Assembly, taking 98% of the vote. According to mother earth
need, ‘’women danced in the streets of Nairobi for joy. ‘’Inside space just a few weeks
after kebaki to took over the presidency, hi appointed me deputy minister of the
environment, natural resources and wildlife.

I sought to end the devastation of Kenya’s forests and lands caused by development and
remedy the negative impact that these development had on the country's environment. In
1977, I launched the green belt movement to reforest my beloved country while helping
the nations women. Women’s’’ needed income and they needed resources because they
are where being depleted,’’ I explained to People magazine. Sorry’’ we decided to solve
problem both problems together.’’

It is trees that I has used to build my women’s environment. Through my efforts, women across Africa
have planned 10 of millions of trees and done their Part to stop the deforestation that has tripped
much of the continent bear. My green belt movement has also nurtured as many women as it is has
acacias and cedars.

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