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Thursday, October 20, 2011

Three Ladies, One Award

Editorial:
On 07 October, as Sikkim was just emerging from the horror of the 18 September Earthquake and midway into a subdued Dasain celebration, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2011 will be divided in three equal parts between Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Leymah Gbowee and Tawakkul Karman for their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s rights to full participation in peace-building work.
 “We cannot achieve democracy and lasting peace in the world unless women obtain the same opportunities as men to influence developments at all levels of society,” the Nobel Committee endorsed, concluding with the hope that the Nobel Peace Prize will “help to bring an end to the suppression of women that still occurs in many countries, and to realise the great potential for democracy and peace that women can represent.” The suppression of women in their own homes and societies and the violence they are subjected to in times of peace and armed conflict remain distressing realities across the world. The UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1325 in October 2000 making violence against women in armed conflict an international issue for the first time. The resolution has met with limited success, but at least an issue has been flagged, a mirror held up. The Resolution also underlined the need for women to become participants on an equal footing with men in peace processes and in peace work in general.
Although the Nobel Committee has lauded the three ladies for their contributions to safety of women, to see them as working only for women would be an unfair assessment of their efforts and achievements. All three are undoubtedly strong women, but they were motivated to take the stands they did out of commitment and concern for all people, women, men and children, and not just women alone. All three of them operated in suffocating environments of male domination, but they succeeded not because they represented women, but because they managed to inspire both sexes. At the risk of running a cliché, it needs to be recognised that their arrival was welcome because women are rarely allowed the room to effect change with the compassion only they can find to nuance their stronger commitment and more resolute work ethic. What makes them special is that they were not born into their roles and did not inherit positions, but worked with the people and led them so exceptionally well.
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is Africa’s first democratically elected female president. Since her inauguration in 2006 as the President of Liberia, she secured peace, promoted economic and social development, and strengthened the position of women. Leymah Gbowee, her compatriot, mobilized and organized women across ethnic and religious divides to build social and moral pressure so overpowering that even the warlords who had torn the country up in a vicious civil war were forced to the negotiation table and a despotic President convinced to step down. At 32, Yemeni activist Tawakkul Karman is one of the youngest recipients of the prize. A mother of three, she was recognised for her role in the Arab Spring. As chairwoman of Women Journalists Without Chains, an organisation that defends human rights and freedom of expression, including the freedom to protest, her typical work involved trying to get other protestors against the government of Ali Abdullah Saleh out of jail. It is interesting that the three ladies represent three different generations. Where Sirleaf is 73 years old, Gbowee is 40 and Karman 32. What they share in common is education, forthrightness and the willingness to pursue a goal for all people without the baggage of personal ambition. Sirleaf is Harvard educated and was part of the government when she spoke out against the powers that be in Liberia, was nearly killed by soldiers and lived a part of her life in exile. Gbowee was a policewoman who managed to convince mothers, daughters and sisters across religious divides to launch a non-violent protest demanding an end to the civil war. Her collaboration with Sirleaf helped end a decade and a half of civil war in 2003 which had claimed 2.5 lakh lives. Karman leads a journalists association, is aligned to a political group in Opposition in Yemen, has survived an assassination attempt, been in jail many times and has discarded the hijab because even as she champions the cause of freedom, she strives for women’s empowerment and against child marriage as well. Unlike the other stars of the Arab Spring, she has not used social media as a platform for networking and protest and has been on the streets, among the people for nearly a decade now. Yemen has not changed much, the government there has denounced the Peace Prize for her, but her movement has gathered more steam. All three deserve the recognition so that the message of what individual will can achieve for a community in distress needs to be sounded more loudly, across more corners...

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