Power for Some, but Poverty, Abuse for Millions More

Aug. 31, 2007 — -- Emily Owino has probably never heard of German Chancellor Angela Merkel or U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice or any of the other 98 politicians and corporate executives who make up this year's Forbes magazine list of the world's most powerful women.

While the women who made the list are worthy of admiration, millions of powerless women worldwide like Owino — a Kenyan widow whose in-laws had her raped and thrown out of her home after her husband's death — are equally worthy of attention.

Forbes picked its most powerful women by looking at their economic prowess and citations in the media, but the world's most powerless women are, for the most part, poor and invisible.

It is not just poverty, however, experts told ABCNEWS.com, that keeps women from effecting change in their own lives and the lives of others; it is a variety of factors, from deep-seated cultural mores, lack of access to education and discrimination, to disease, war and unfair laws.

By custom, Owino, 61, was ritually raped by a stranger on the order of her in-laws in order to keep the house in which she had lived since marrying her husband at 15, Human Rights Watch reported.

"They said I had to be cleansed [raped] in order to stay in my home," Owino told Human Rights Watch. "I tried to refuse, but my in-laws said I must be cleansed or they'd beat me and chase me out of my home. … I had young children who were sick and no one would assist us. I couldn't buy clothes, we couldn't eat and I had no cooking pots. When I came back from my mother's home, I saw that my land and last few possessions were taken. I was destitute."

While customs, laws and contributing factors differ around the world, the plights of powerless women in the developing world are surprisingly similar.

"There are some really pretty powerless women because there are legal and cultural things these women can do nothing about," said Kathy Blakeslee, director of the women in development office at the United States Agency for International Development.