Living Letters are small ecumenical teams. Within the framework of the WCC Decade to Overcome Violence, they travel to different parts of the world where Christians are striving to promote peace.
After the 14 year-long independence war with Portugal ended in 1975, Angola suffered a 27-year civil war which killed hundreds of thousands of people, left scores of internally displaced and devastated the economy and infrastructure.
Despite the current post-war reconstruction boom – Angola is one of Africa's major oil producers – two thirds of its population of 17.5 million live on less than two US dollars a day, the World Bank estimates. Life expectancy is about 41 years for men and 44 years for women.
"Almost every family has been affected one way or another by the long decades of war. As a consequence, major situations of trauma are widespread", says Sandemba, who is responsible for the women's work at the Council of Christian Churches in Angola (CICA).
In this context, women pay the highest price, Sandemba adds. "They live with former combatants, now demobilised, or with relatives who have suffered amputations or other injuries, and in many cases they live under the poverty line."
In Luanda, the country's capital, "women typically leave home at 3 am to look for saleable goods, and often walk through the whole city, sometimes pregnant or carrying little children", she explained. "When they reach home, at about 10 pm, they might have earned 200 kwanzas (less than $3), but if sales were not good, there may not be anything for dinner."
Hard, exhausting work to feed their families is not the only hardship women face in Angola. Although statistical data is nonexistent or unreliable, concern about growing levels of violence against women both at home and on the streets is widespread.
Paulo de Almeida, the national police chief has reportedly said that "rapes are taking place daily", constituting a worrying and growing "phenomenon that nobody can explain". But women do not seem to be safer in their homes either.
"The issue of domestic violence is taking frightening dimensions", says the Rev José Antonio, general secretary of the Evangelical Reformed Church of Angola (IERA). This happens mainly in Luanda, but also in other places, he adds.
