"African women who succeed abroad want to give back what they've received"

Skilled women offer not only their professional skills and knowledge, but also hope for little girls and young women. They are role models for them, showing them that it is possible for women to reach positions like theirs. Their contribution is different from men's. AIDS is a very common disease in Africa. In urban areas, more women are infected than men. These women carriers of the virus can help staunch the spread of the disease by giving talks and raising awareness.

Another example can be found in education. Most university professors are men, despite the policies to increase the number of women university students. Women who manage to become university professors, company managers, etc. thus act as important role models, offering living proof that women can succeed. Yes. African women who succeed abroad want to give back what they've received. Their work is quite important, because, in addition to being highly skilled, they have the added value of familiarity with their home country's culture. This makes them an invaluable resource for the development of African societies. They can offer both face-to-face and virtual training in their respective fields and thus help their countries advance. Foreign NGOs can help a country at a given time, but they do not prepare its people to survive on their own in future. It's hard to know what impact gender discrimination has on the decision to emigrate. While it may be a factor, the main reasons are family-related (family reunification) or socio-economic. Yes, because they break moulds. Sometimes, even their own families don't approve of their lifestyle. For instance, I know of a married couple of academics from Ethiopia who migrated to Italy, where they both got jobs at a university. The woman adapted more easily to Western life because, compared to life in her country, she had more freedom: she had a job, her own income, friends, etc. This weakened the marriage, because the man wanted to maintain the same lifestyle they'd had in Ethiopia: where the woman did all the housework, wasn't economically independent, didn't have her own friends, etc.

Ultimately, they separated, and the woman returned alone to Ethiopia with their two children, to be near her family. But her family criticized her for having left her husband. Yes. There was another case of a woman with an executive position at an Ethiopian company. During the day, she and the other company executives would take a decision. In the evening, she would go home, while the other executives would go out for a drink. The next morning, she would discover that the men had taken a different decision while they'd been out for the drink despite the fact that she wasn't there. Her opinion didn't matter. That case is representative of how things generally work in that country, and it happens again and again to women in different contexts. No. The younger generations are more egalitarian. The elders criticize their attitude, claiming they're pro-Western, but really they just believe in women's freedom. There are more and more young women who refuse to bite their tongue or be controlled.