A group in Abyei is calling for women to have the right to wear clothes of their own choice whenever they are in public.

Traditionally, a married woman is supposed to put on clothes of a color relating to her husband’s age group. A woman of a more senior generation has the right to demand that a younger woman removes clothes of a color deemed to be inappropriate.

Director of the Abyei Women’s Empowerment Organization, Tabitha Chol Manyiel, said it could not be right for an older woman to dictate how someone else dressed. Tabitha's organization wants elders to stop limiting women to wearing clothes of a single color outside the home.

Tabitha said there might be formal occasions when it made sense for two age generations to dress differently, but otherwise women should be free to choose.

32-year-old Nyanbech Thuch, from Agok, said she was once asked to go home and remove her clothes. She agreed because she was not threatened with force, but she did not want to. She said it was difficult and boring to wear clothes of the same color all the time.

74-year-old Aru Bol, an elder from Mading Achueng, said the color tradition meant that other people could quickly tell which age generation a woman’s husband belonged to. That should not stop, he insisted. 

67-year-old Nyanguen Malek, a groundnut paste seller in Aniet market, said women should observe the tradition. She said if younger women wore the same color as her, she would not be marked out as an elder and receive the respect she deserved.

The acting Paramount Chief, Nyol Paguot, said that taking a woman’s clothes by force was an offence. He said he would meet the other clan chiefs soon to discuss the matter. 

Reporting by Abyei Today