'Today things have changed'

As South Africans celebrated Women's Day yesterday, one of the country's oldest citizens recalled that once women were not allowed to go to school or have a formal education.

Yesterday, 117-year-old Nomadiphu Ntombela, of Emachibini, in Mtubatuba, on the KwaZulu-Natal North Coast, recalled the strides women have made over the past 11 decades.

Born to uneducated parents more than a century ago, Ntombela yesterday spoke of how difficult life was for women, particularly those from rural areas.

"Women were not allowed to have education, formal or informal. I remember when I was a teenager working the neighbourhood by selling animal skins and fruit. I bought myself a dress which I was going to wear to school but my father got hold of it and burned it," she recalled, her wrinkled-face smiling.

Not willing to give up, Ntombela sold more fruit and bought a second dress.

"Even today, I can't understand how he figured out that I bought another one. But he got hold of it and burned it. But this time he went further by beating me, saying I disobeyed him.

''He said a woman could not go to school because she would be a loose cannon and immoral. Actually, all fathers felt the same. They believed that schooling made women to sleep around.

"Those were difficult times for women but today things have changed. I allow my great-grandchildren to go to school because education is important."

Though Ntombela cannot remember the 1956 march by 20000 women to the Union Buildings against the pass laws, she is grateful for their achievement.

Ntombela attributes her longevity to the respectful way in which she conducted herself.

"I was respectful. I adored my grandmother, who was so old that I had to pull her with iskhumba [cow hide].

''Maybe that is why I have lived for so many years. Today's youth don't treat grannies with respect and that is why they die so young,'' she said.