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  #21  
Old Friday, March 08, 2013
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The strength of Pakistani women
By: Maryam Chloé Pervaiz | March 08, 2013

It is not every day that a housewife tells you that she has spent two years talking to pirates. This has nothing to do with watching a Johnny Depp film or reading Peter Pan. It happened when I met Captain Jawaid Saleem’s family for dinner to hear about the capture of his ship, MV Albedo, by Somali pirates. As I listened to the chilling tale, I found myself truly inspired by the way in which his wife had faced the circumstances.

When Captain Jawaid set course for Mombasa in November 2010, Shahnaz Jawaid never imagined it was the course of her life that was about to change dramatically. The shipping agent informed her a few days later that her husband’s vessel had been hijacked. She was abruptly cast in a role that she was never prepared for.

Staggering emotionally from the blow, Shahnaz braced herself to face the worst. For the next two years, she would live with the ever-present threat of pirates killing her husband. She could not allow herself to give in to fear. She had to find a way to get her husband back home safely. She had her children to think of, too. With remarkable self-control, she waited until her daughter had finished an important course of study before divulging the news to her.
Being the Captain’s wife, Shahnaz was also concerned about the welfare of the other Pakistani hostages on board the ship. Some of their families did not live in Karachi. The best chance of raising ransom money was to appeal to the public. Shahnaz summoned up all her resolve and began her campaign to bring all the families, even those from out of Karachi, together on a common platform for media coverage.

Weeks turned into months. The shipping company stopped paying salaries to the abducted men. The families struggled financially. Once, Shahnaz was even told her husband had died. It was the lowest point for her in this trial.

A big challenge for Shahnaz was having to appeal to the pirates themselves. They were impatient men, who barely spoke English. Initially, she needed the help of a translator to communicate with them. It is no small compliment that these harsh kidnappers came to respect Shahnaz in the course of this dangerous international crisis. They started to contact her personally.
Ordered by a pirate to put him in touch with a Pakistani official late one night, Shahnaz was mugged on the way home. The pirate was talking to her when an armed boy snatched away her cell phone, pirate and all. Thinking Shahnaz had hung up on him, the pirate later called on her landline. He discovered that he certainly wasn’t the only bandit she had been dealing with that night! Shahnaz now laughs at the absurdity of the whole situation. It was harrowing at the time.

Governor Ishratul Ebad stepped forward in this case on humanitarian grounds. With his consent, Ahmed Chinoy, Chief of the Citizens Police Liaison Committee (CPLC), played a vital role in the negotiations. The families spent days and nights at the CPLC Headquarters, receiving the much needed moral support. The CPLC handles several emergencies at any given time. It takes someone like Shahnaz, with faith and persistence, to keep attention focused on a case. The Somalis were actually reluctant to release Captain Jawaid, afraid they would lose their menacing hold on Shahnaz. They wanted her to help them in negotiating for the remaining hostages.

The Pakistani crew finally returned home safely. Shahnaz Jawaid and her family are thankful to be reunited. Indeed, Shahnaz has shown us that a Pakistani housewife can display tremendous courage and deal with the toughest people in the toughest times. Her story is a tribute to the strength of Pakistani women everywhere.

The writer is a student at the Karachi American School. Email: m.c.pervaiz@gmail.com

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The gender agenda
By: Atle Hetland | March 07, 2013 .

For the first time, the UN marked the International Women’s Day on March 08, 1975. It was recommended to the member states to mark March 08 as an International Women’s Day, or they could choose another day related to women in their own country’s history and tradition.

March 08 has become the main day to celebrate women throughout the world and to debate issues to improve gender equality and women’s empowerment. Four international UN conferences have been held, first in Mexico in 2005, then in Copenhagen, Nairobi and Beijing, and several stocktaking conferences in New York to evaluate the implementation of recommendations.

Major achievements have been made. Many issues were put on the broader agenda by the UN. But the concrete debate and action were always fought and achieved by women’s organisations, in collaboration with other groups, research institutions, workers’ organisations and national governments. Laws have been changed in many fields, such as more equal payment for men and women, and maternity leave has been introduced or made longer, in a few countries also with some paternity leave. More focus has been given to how to stop violence against women, which is the theme on this year’s International Women’s Day. The right to abortion has been made legal in most countries, and it has become common that it is the woman herself, who decides whether she should terminate her pregnancy or not. Abortion is always the last option, and it often has psychological and other side-effects; yet, it is seen as a right that women decide over their own body.

Certainly, women’s emancipation did not start in 1975 at the UN Women’s Conference in Mexico! But the last 40 years, and the UN’s accelerated fight for greater equality between women and men, has led to the improvement of women’s lives. But the fight for greater equality has been significant for longer, at least for a 100 years. The labour movements in North America and Europe took up women’s rights, mainly related to work conditions and pay. Information about contraception and other reproductive health issues were also important.

Historically, it is new to place women’s equal social and political rights at par with men’s rights. No country allowed women to vote until the 20th century; New Zealand and Finland were the first ones. Most countries in the West followed suit in a decade or two. This year, Norway marks the 100th anniversary of women’s right to vote. And when the countries in the West boast about ‘newfound equality and democratic rights for all’, we should be reminded that there wasn’t much of either in the colonies and protectorates ruled by the Western powers, mainly the UK, France, Portugal, Spain, and Holland. The Scandinavian countries pride themselves on not having had colonies, but they also sided with European superpowers and took part in what we today would term unethical international trade.

A few days ago, Gloria Steinem, a leading American feminist, political and social activist, writer and journalist, was interviewed on BBC. She said that there was more need for women’s emancipation now than in the 1970s at the height of the modern women’s liberation movement. She came herself into the movement through journalism, and also through seeing abuse and difficulties in her childhood. In 1969, when she wrote an article titled “After Black Power, Women’s Power”, she became an instant authority. She captured the zeitgeist and feelings of women in America and beyond. Men were, perhaps, less on board that time.

In the interview, Steinem stressed that there are now also many feminist men. In other words, ‘women’s equality’ has become ‘gender equality’ and is seen as important for women and men alike, although still, certain issues are only about women. But when there is oppression, it is not only the oppressed that suffers, but also the oppressors; inequality in race relations and apartheid being a clear point in case.

I believe we have moved fast towards greater gender equality in the course of a few generations. In Europe, it would be strange to go into an office with only men (and a woman as Secretary at the reception). When I held my first job in Oslo in 1973, such work environments were not uncommon, and most bosses were men. Television programmes could have only men to debate political issues. Except for a few foreign university students and some newly arrived Pakistanis (from Gujrat) driving trams and working in city restaurants, there was hardly a non-European face to be seen in public or on TV. Now, there are more than 250,000 from outside Europe in Norway, in a population of five million.

I believe that diversity and multiculturalism are important for any society. People should integrate, but we don’t have to assimilate and become the same. Yet, we should learn about each other so that we can appreciate each other more. If we belong to the powerful majority group, it is our duty to help the minorities, the newcomers and others to integrate, and to do what they want to do, including being as good believers in their faiths as they can be. Women, too, have a duty to include women and men from outside in their spheres and in majority life - now when women are more and more in decision-making positions.

When Pakistani, Iraqi, Iranian, Turkish and other immigrants reach Scandinavia, they will be impressed by the role of women in society, including about 50 percent of government ministers being women, directors in government ministries and board members in publicly registered companies. Most men and women agree that it is better when there is more gender equality. But even in Scandinavia, in the most egalitarian countries in the world, there is more work to do, especially now in a time of economic and financial difficulties. The Head of UN Women in Pakistan, Lena Lindberg, from Sweden herself, underlined this in a talk in Islamabad a few days ago.
In Scandinavia, it is important to continue the debate about how we organise our daily lives. How can working parents with young children find ways of living so that their lives become less stressful? Maybe working hours should be shorter? New values and ways concerning career, home-life and social-political life must be found. Even Scandinavia is just on en route, and lessons about how to organise ‘the good life’, with equality and empowered women and men, are still being sought.

Sometimes, Pakistanis and people in other developing countries, too, have lessons to teach the highly efficient and individualistic Westerners. Many rural and urban values from different cultures should be appreciated in order to find the best development paths - and they are not the prerogative of the rich and old countries only.

The theme for International Women’s Day this year is about how to end domestic and other violence against women and violence in society at large. Several Pakistani women have in recent years become role models for women and men all over the world - and then we don’t even talk about all the ‘everyday heroines’. Many times, Pakistani men also tell me that women are cleverer than men at school and in jobs.

A less competitive world with more equality will be more peaceful and happier. It is a scar on humanity and especially the leaders in our time, that we have dozens of ongoing wars and armed conflicts. The foreign invasion of Afghanistan is particularly sad, and indeed the war on terror, with many negative consequences for Pakistan. The structural violence of major inequality between the north and south can also be solved if there is political will among powerful countries. In many cases, globalisation is not positive.
In the homes, workplaces, local communities and elsewhere within countries, we must make peaceful changes - if those who have power give priority to it. In many cases, violence against women can be reduced if the men want to change the situation. If it becomes politically, socially and legally unacceptable to beat a woman and a child and anyone else who is weak, such crimes will be few.

Women must keep up their peaceful fight for their rights, for human rights, together with feminist men. And then, when change, equality and peace come, we will all realise that the world has become better and more in line with God’s will for all his or her creatures.

Dear women and men, congratulations on the International Women’s Day 2013!

The writer is a senior Norwegian social scientist with experience from research, diplomacy and development aid. Email: atlehetland@yahoo.com*

nation.com.pk
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Old Friday, March 08, 2013
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From dream to reality
By: Farzana Raja | March 08, 2013 .

It is truly a matter of immense pride and satisfaction for me that Pakistan has made vital inroads to support women empowerment and emancipation during last few years.

The Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) is one of the largest achievements in the social sector of Pakistan. This breakthrough has special significance for me because the programme has not only laid the foundation for sustainable poverty reduction, but has also been able to change the hearts and minds of the people in general about the status of women in our society.

While marking the International Women’s Day, I would like to recall that mainstreaming of women and their socio-economic uplift was envisaged as one of the prime objectives of BISP at the very beginning of this unique initiative in the social sector, besides poverty alleviation.

We as a nation are grateful to Mohtarma Fatima Jinnah, Begum Rana Liaquat Ali Khan and Mother of Democracy Lady Nusrat Bhutto, who played a significant role in the empowerment of women in Pakistan. And inspired by the dynamic leadership and vision of Shaheed Benazir Bhutto, the programme (BISP) was designed to achieve the desired goals of empowering the women folk and making them understand their basic rights.

There is no denying the fact that women empowerment is a key phenomenon for bringing about sustainable socio-economic progress of every society or nation. This forward-looking approach is helping societies to fully benefit from the active participation of women from every walk of life.

It is also worth noting that the women of today are more aware of their role, existence and rights than ever before.

The International Women’s Day is equally significant for Pakistani women, who have made an epic struggle to protect and safeguard the rights of millions of voiceless women in our society. Some historic achievements have been made during this momentous struggle, but still there is a long way to go to uplift the status of women in society.

During the recent years, some landmarks have already been achieved regarding the protection of women’s rights. It is quite an encouraging advancement to achieve the ultimate fruits of women empowerment and emancipation, as envisioned by the Father of the Nation, Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah.

Our great Quaid was of view that “no nation can ever be worthy of its existence that cannot take its women along with the men. No struggle can ever succeed without women participating side by side with men.”
The history of Pakistan is evident of the fact that it was the democratic government of Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, which revived Jinnah’s vision in its true spirit by taking practical measures to protect the rights of women and by making the welfare of women an integral part of the social, political and economic reforms.

Later, after a long period of tyranny during which the women suffered the most, Shaheed Benazir Bhutto introduced various women-friendly policies to revive their status in society and to reduce their socio-economic hardships. She was, indeed, an ardent believer in women’s rights and empowerment, and thus served the cause of women by making it the foundation stone of her government’s policies.

The commitment of Shaheed Benazir Bhutto for the cause of women has always been a great source of inspiration for me. The first-ever Ministry of Women in the federal cabinet was also introduced by our Shaheed leader. Besides, she introduced several revolutionary policies aiming to empower women.

While highlighting the significance of women empowerment, Shaheed Benazir Bhutto once said: “Empowerment is the right to be economically independent. Empowerment is the right to be educated and make choices. Empowerment is the right to have the opportunity to select a career. Empowerment is the right to own property, to start a business, to flourish in the marketplace.”
Today BISP, through its multipronged poverty reduction and women empowerment strategy has incorporated the entire vision of Shaheed Benazir Bhutto in the form of its different components, i.e. Waseela-e-Haq, Waseela-e-Rozgar, Waseela-e-Taleem as well as health and life insurance covering millions of beneficiary families with women as primary recipients.

In the pursuit of the Shaheed leader’s vision, the PPP-led democratic government, during its constitutional tenure of five years, has introduced a number of new laws aiming to protect and safeguard the rights of women.
The women of Pakistan are still facing a number of challenges. However, it is being anticipated that the negative societal behaviours and the anti-women mindset would finally be defeated through dedicated efforts at various levels.
BISP, as a comprehensive social safety net, has played the most vital and much needed role in enhancing the cause of women’s socio-economic uplift and empowerment. By virtue of making women heads of the family and prime beneficiaries, this initiative proved to be a gaint leap and this fact has won the recognition from credible international organisations all over the world.
Thank God, more than 1.5 million women have obtained their Computerised National Identity Card (CNIC) during the last four years only to be eligible to get registered with BISP as beneficiary of the programme. It is determined to give women their lost identity in the future development of Pakistan.

The International Women’s Day provides us a chance of re-evaluating our endeavours for empowering the women of the country and to further re-established our commitment with the cause of uplifting their status in our society.

Inshallah, Pakistan will emerge as a responsible welfare state of the modern era.

The writer is federal minister and chairperson of the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP)

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Rape and respectability
By:Nadia Khawaja

Most people regard the International Women’s Day (IWD) as an occasion to pay tribute to the accomplishments of women – but it also serves as a grim reminder of the trials and tribulations faced by women in a patriachal world. The existence of a separate day dedicated to women places them in the realm of the social ‘other’, different from and still not equal to a man. Despite new legislation drafted to promote equality, the soaring success of women in a range of fields and feminism moving from a political to a more theoretical agenda, the theme for this year’s IWD, “A promise is a promise: time for action to end violence against women,” aptly reasserts that the struggle to end gender discrimination has not moved past its foundational stages. As the conversation focuses on the essential safety and security of women, it reminds us that feminism is as relevant today as it was a hundred years ago, when IWD was first celebrated.

Multiple cases of women being brutally raped have surfaced in the past few years; in their latest Violence Against Women Report, the women’s welfare NGO, Aurat Foundation, reports that the percentage of reported cases of violence against women in Pakistan has risen by 6.47 percent from 2010 to 2011. In India, a 23-year old girl was gang raped and murdered on a bus while a fifteen year old girl in Maldives was ‘allegedly’ raped by her step-father and a high-school student was reported to have been harassed and raped by her classmates in Ohio in the US. But these are only the cases that garner international media attention; in Pakistan there are 827 reported cases of rape in 2011 alone, in addition to the countless cases that go unreported every day. While these number of incidents is gruesome, what is even more terrifying is how society has reacted to such instances of violence. Following the Delhi-rape case, the defense lawyer made a statement that reflects the rape culture in a nutshell: “Until today, I have not seen a single incident or example when a respected lady has been raped. Even an underworld don would not like to touch a girl with respect.” Depressingly, the “respected ladies don’t get raped by the mafia” argument is not an anomaly as many prominent Indian politicians shared his reasoning. The West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banarjee said, “Earlier, if men and women would hold hands, they would get caught by parents and reprimanded but now everything is open. It’s like an open market with open options.” To give another example of victim blaming, in the Maldives case, the 15-year-old alleged rape victim is being sentenced to a 100 lashes for premarital sex. We are living in a society that not only tolerates such crimes but also rationalises them while treating male sexual aggression as a norm. In her article on rape culture, Melissa McEwan suggests that “Rape culture is tasking victims with the burden of rape prevention. Rape culture is refusing to acknowledge that the only thing a person can do to avoid being raped is not to be in the same room as a rapist.” How is a woman to register that she is an equal when she feels unsafe walking out of her house? When she always has be alert, always has to pay attention, always has to has to watch her back, always has to be aware of her surroundings and must never let her guard down for a moment lest she be sexually assaulted and if despite all of this protection, she is raped, she will be made to think it was “her fault”.

As we rave on about ‘violence against women,’ it is useful to provide a definition of what it means. Violence against women is any act of gender based violence, whether physical, sexual or mental or the threat of such, that causes suffering to women. Violence is not restricted to extreme acts such as bride-burning, rape or honor-killing, rather most women face violence in a much more discreet manner, living in a society that views them as subordinate beings. In a culture such as ours, women face violence that begins with discriminatory remarks to rape itself. Such a culture is created through the objectification of women, which is part of a dehumanizing process involving the regulation of their behavior, their bodies and their thinking. Take the media’s eroticization of violence—for instance in the latest James Bond movie ‘Skyfall’, Bond stands by as Javier Bardem shoots a woman in the head, causing the glass of whiskey on her head to topple to the ground and casually remarks “what a waste of good scotch.” Diminishing the gravity of such acts, even in fiction, normalizes violence against women and makes us disassociate with the fact that women constantly live under the threat of assault. Even the language we speak contains phrases that are laced with an attitude of aggression towards women and uses sexual violence as a metaphor in mainstream discourse—“The ATM raped me with a huge fee.”

Furthermore, silence provokes violence. The silence around the discrimination of women in national discourse, in homes, in schools, in streets, helps in promoting gender inequality. Aurat Foundation cites the failure to report cases of violence as a “lack of confidence” on the part of women, however this does not account for the fact that women have been taught not to speak, to repress their thoughts and desires, through the threat of admonishment. As we think of violence against women today and what we can do to prevent it, we need to focus on changing the culture as a whole, check ourselves when we speak, be critical about what we watch and conscious of how our society works.

“There is one universal truth, applicable to all countries, cultures and communities: violence against women is never

acceptable, never excusable, never tolerable.” — Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon

The writer is a staff member of Pakistan Today and holds a degree from Mount Holyoke College.

http://www.pakistantoday.com.pk
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Old Saturday, March 09, 2013
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International Women’s Day
March 09, 2013 .


The theme of International Women's Day 2013 is the prevention of violence against women. The UN estimates that more than two-thirds of women and girls across the world have experienced sexual or physical violence. But time to say ‘enough is enough’ has come. Discrimination or violence against women has no room in the 21st century. It is time to realize the full meaning of the term, ‘gender equality’. The situation calls for introspection. The conditions of Pakistani women vary from bad to worse; a woman in the tribal areas experiences an entirely different life than a woman in the urban centres, but both have their own challenges.

It was a sad reflection on us that the World Economic Forum last year ranked Pakistan among the worst countries in the world on its Global Gender Gap Report. Women in our society are being subjected to some of the worst kinds of atrocities including rape, acid throwing, honour killing, forced marriage and forced prostitution. The situation is a challenge for the government and NGOs working to improve the life of the nation’s female lot. At the same time, it is a fundamental responsibility of the media---electronic as well as print--- to educate masses about the inviolable rights of women.

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Altering gender bias

Shahid Khalil


Women in Pakistan are certainly not treated fairly either in the urban or rural area. The discrimination against them is particularly stark in the rural regions, where the incidence of poverty is also very high.

However, as the world celebrates International Women's Day, Pakistani women from rural regions have shown increasing confidence as they become aware of their rights. "I believe that a woman must be educated and must work in order to prove herself in society and to be a better mother", said Zaibunisa a young and hardly educated woman from Dera Bugti. Women should work insisted Fatima Bi who works at a garment factory in a village near Lahore. "Why should I stay at home if I can work outside" she asked. "I should also earn income and my people and I should enjoy the money I can make," she added.

"Those days where our mothers had to ask for money from our fathers, even for simple things like underwear are gone: we need our own money and this means that we should work" she said. This is a good omen but there is still a long way to go.

Female farmers and entrepreneurs have less access to land than their male counterparts. Similarly, both the demand for and use of credit are lower among female farmers and entrepreneurs than among their male counterparts. These differences are rooted in failures of markets and institutions and in their interactions with household responses.

For example, accessing credit often requires collateral, preferably land or immobile assets. Women are, thus, at a disadvantage because they have lower or less secure access to land and are disproportionately employed in the service sector where capitalization is lower and output is often intangible. These forces may be further reinforced by gender-based preferences in the households that can lead to unequal resource allocations (of land, for example) to male and female members.

The combined forces of markets, service delivery institutions, and income growth that have contributed to closing gender gaps in education, and labour force participation for many women have not worked for everyone. For poor women and for women in very poor places, sizable gender gaps remain. And these gaps are even worse where poverty combines with other factors of exclusion - such as ethnicity, caste, remoteness, race, disability, or sexual orientation.

Even in education, where gaps have narrowed in most countries, girls' enrollment in primary and secondary school has improved little in many Sub-Saharan countries and some parts of South Asia. School enrollments for girls in Mali are comparable to those in the United States in 1810, and the situation in Ethiopia and Pakistan is not much better. In many countries, gender disparities remain large only for those who are poor. In both India and Pakistan, while boys and girls from the top income quantile participate in school at similar rates, there is a gender gap of almost five years in the bottom income quantile.

Beyond the poor, gender gaps remain particularly large for groups for whom ethnicity, geographical distance, and other factors (such as disability or sexual orientation) compound gender inequality. Almost two-thirds of out-of school girls globally belong to ethnic minority groups in their own countries. The illiteracy rate among indigenous women in Guatemala stands at 60 per cent, 20 points above indigenous men and twice the rate of non-indigenous women. For these severely disadvantaged groups - which can be pockets of disadvantage or entire swaths of countries or regions - none of the forces that favor educating girls and young women are working. So, the growth in aggregate income may not be broad-based enough to benefit poor households. Market signals are muted because economic opportunities for women do not expand much or because other barriers - such as exclusion caused by ethnicity, race, or caste - get in the way of accessing those opportunities.

In agriculture and entrepreneurship, large and significant gender disparities in access to inputs (including land and credit) and in asset ownership are at the root of the gender productivity gap. Indeed, yield differences for female and male farmers disappear altogether when access to productive inputs is taken into account. Differences in access to inputs may be further compounded by differences in the availability of "market time," as noted above, which can make the same investment less productive for women than for men.

In much of the world, women have less input than men in decision making in their households, in their communities, and in their societies. Consider women's underrepresentation in formal politics, especially in its upper reaches. Fewer than one-fifth of all cabinet positions is held by women. And women's lack of representation extends to the judiciary and labor unions.

These patterns do not change much as countries get richer. The share of women parliamentarians increased only from 10 per cent to 17 per cent between 1995 and 2009.

Sometimes service delivery institutions fail, for young girls and women during childbirth. Other times markets do not work well, with results that are worse for women, as illustrated by evidence of discrimination in both labor and credit markets. Often reinforcing these market failures, however, are formal institutions that treat women and men differently. Laws and regulations can constrain women's agency and opportunities more than those of men, as when women and men have different ownership rights, or when restrictions are placed on hours and sectors of work for women but not for men. Where credit and labor markets already discriminate, such unequal laws and regulations can accentuate the problem. Unequal treatment may also manifest itself more indirectly through biased service delivery, as is the case for agriculture extension services. Here, institutional bias and market structure (with women underrepresented in nonfood crops that are often the target of extension services) reinforce and even deepen inequalities.

Addressing gender gaps in human capital endowments - excess female mortality at specific periods of the life cycle and pockets of gender disadvantage in education - requires fixing the institutions that deliver public services. Providing basic services in a timely manner to expectant mothers and improving the availability of clean water and sanitation to households will go a long way to closing the gender gaps in excess mortality.

Education services need to focus on improving access for the significant population groups that are currently disadvantaged by poverty, ethnicity, caste, race, or geography. Such a focus will help address the "gender inequality traps" that affect the poor and excluded in society.

Improving the delivery of maternal care is hard, but it can be done - even at relatively low incomes, as Sri Lanka and Malaysia show. From more than 2,000 per 100,000 births in the 1930s, the maternal mortality ratio in Sri Lanka fell to about 1,000 by 1947, and then halved to less than 500 in the next three years. By 1996, it had fallen to 24. In Malaysia, it halved from 534 over the seven years from 1950 to 1957. Then, with a halving every decade or so, it came down to 19 by 1997.

To overcome the range of institutional obstacles that hampers the effective workings of health systems, Sri Lanka and Malaysia adopted integrated and phased approaches. And they did this with modest total public expenditures on health - 1.8 per cent of gross domestic product, on average, since the 1950s.

Health programs in both countries exploited synergistic interactions of health care with basic education, water and sanitation, malaria control, and integrated rural development - including building rural roads, which helped deal with obstetric emergencies. Financial, geographic, and cultural barriers to maternal care were addressed by ensuring a front line of competent, professional midwives widely available in rural areas, providing them with a steady supply of drugs and equipment, linking them to back-up services, and improving communication and transportation. Simultaneously, facilities were strengthened to provide obstetric care and deal with complications.

Better organizational management improved the supervision and accountability of the providers. Area specific mortality data were provided through monitoring systems so that empowered communities could hold political leaders accountable and national and sub national actors were forced to recognize the unacceptability of every maternal death. Finally, both countries were strongly committed to improving the status of women: women gained voting rights before or soon after national independence, and female education received special attention.

http://www.weeklycuttingedge.com/women01.htm
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Affirmative action undermines equality

By:Nadia Khawaja Thursday, 21 Mar 2013

Is creating quotas for women in parliament advancing gender equality?

As the elections draw closer, the nation continues to speculate on a number of issues ranging from the democratic future of the country to the management of the energy crisis. I would like to draw attention to a matter involving the structure of politics in Pakistan, specifically the policies governing the appointment of women to the national and provincial assemblies. As per Article 51 of the constitution, 60 out of the 342 seats in the National Assembly must be reserved for women. Similarly, 17 percent of the total number of seats in the four provincial assemblies must also be set aside for women, guaranteeing their participation in national politics. The creation of such a quota, known as affirmative action, is a policy instituted by the government/legislative body to ensure the participation and inclusion of minority groups in society. Affirmative action policies are preceded by the recognition that the group in question is marginalised and discriminated against and they seek to level the playing field by creating quotas to guarantee inclusion. While the involvement of women in politics is most definitely a positive thing, one cannot help but wonder whether the establishment of a quota is counterproductive and reaffirms the subordinate position of women in society, as they need crutches from the government to access positions of power. In an attempt to promote equality by force, affirmative action undermines the principles of democratic election and women’s efforts to achieve real equality. The election of women is often cast into doubt, with people tempted to ask, “Is the woman really outstanding or is she riding the coat tails of misguided social policy?”

Any policy that systematically separates one group of people from another contravenes the principles of equality as it reinforces difference—separating ‘women’s seats’ from ‘general seats’ is claiming that women are indeed the social ‘other’, a subgroup of the male public. Instead of focusing on meritocracy and their validity as politicians, people are drawn to their gender and as a ‘minority group’ they are held to a different standard than men. Affirmative action sends a negative message to the people it was designed to help. The message it sends is: your position is the result of one group’s machinations against you; you are not completely responsible for your own performance; you are a victim and therefore the assurance of your equality will be provided by a higher power i.e. the government via the constitution. Specifying quotas can be seen as an attempt to create a politically correct parliament as it conceals the potential bias against women that could surface if a definite number of seats were not assigned to them. For example, 72 women were members of the national assembly before it was dissolved. This means only 12 women were elected on general seats as opposed to 260 men, highlighting the real struggle women are facing. 72 is a somewhat decent number that inspires hope, 12 serves us the bleak reality and reminds us gender equality is an urgent cause.

Getting female bodies into formal political spaces is only a part of what it takes to engender democracy. In this case, the end does not justify the means, as the ‘strategy’ through which women are elected has a direct impact on the way they are perceived. In their paper “Democratising Democracy: Feminist Perspectives”, Andrea Cornwall and Annie Marie Goetz argue that “much of the focus on the debate of engendering democracy has been on how to insert women into existing democratic structures, with an emphasis primarily on formal political institutions.” Yet, affirmative action only offers a temporary and superficial solution to women’s alienation from the political sphere and it allows the government to be comfortable with a gender-biased society as it has devised a way for statistics to appear otherwise. We need to focus on bringing about changes in political and social systems that make them genuinely inclusive, where 72 women or more can enter the National Assembly through general election. The assumption that democracy can be made more inclusive by creating ‘a reserve of women’ in parliament tends to advantage sex difference over other factors shaping interests and political skills. In addition, women’s seats are filled by assigning seats for parties’ own female nominees in proportion to the seats they have won. This is often seen as a tactic for parties to boost their own majorities and it decentralizes the woman making her selection an extension of her party’s victory only.

Proponents of affirmative action claim that it is impractical not to maintain a quota for women as they are nowhere near achieving the equal status that is required for being able to contest in direct elections. Many argue that the participation of women and by extension, their morale will reach an all time low if reserved seats are abolished. The truth is that an equal, democratic society will never be actualised in a country where women are treated and labeled as a subgroup of men. Affirmative action has never proved to be a long term solution—many colleges that practiced it in 70’s to mitigate racial bias eventually dropped it after students of color protested that they wanted to be accepted for their qualifications, not identity politics. We should strive for a society where women are elected to parliament because they are worthy politicians and not just for the sake of fulfilling a quota.

The writer is a staff member of Pakistan Today and holds a degree from Mount Holyoke College.

http://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2013...ines-equality/
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The changing faces of liberalism

By:Nadia Khawaja

Women should wear whatever they want to


The controversy about the politicization of dress surfaced two years ago, following the French Government’s decision to ban the burqa in public places. The Liberals of the world were left divided as they engaged in heated debates about the principles of liberty and the freedoms of religion and expression. Many argued that such a ban violated the fundamental doctrine of individual freedom while others countered that the burqa in effect, inhibited the emancipation of women and served as a tool of sexist domination. Islamic scholars also offered their opinions on the validity of face covering—Dalil Boubakeur, the grand mufti of the Paris Mosque, issued that the niqab was not prescribed in Islam while the Jamaat-e-Islami held religious protests in Karachi, turning an important ideological discussion into a technical religious matter. Whether Islam orders women to cover their faces is of little significance in a debate that is essentially about the freedom of choice.

Issuing legal restrictions over any kind of dress is the government’s way of discreetly exercising power and control over individuals. Defining the parameters of an acceptable dress code is patriarchal society’s attempt to maintain uniformity; such regulations perpetuate a culture where anyone who dares to be different is treated as a social pariah or deviant. The defining element of fundamentalism, religious or other kinds, is intolerance towards difference and strict adherence to a specific set of principles. If one of the primary arguments against the Islamic concept of purdah is that it symbolizes the subservience of women as it is enforced upon them through the threat of God’s condemnation, then isn’t banning the burqa or coercing women not to wear it, based on a similar ideology of suppression? Here, God is replaced by The Law which upheld via the threat of punishment and social disapproval. Religious fundamentalists classify values and beliefs as beyond question, subsequently placing them in the realm of the Absolute. Deeming an article of clothing as necessarily oppressive and banning it altogether stems from the same branch of absolutist logic.

The argument that the philosophical underpinnings of the burqa convey the fear of female visibility in the public sphere and by extension, the destabilization of patriarchal authority, genuinely threatening advances in women’s rights made over the past century, is undoubtedly a strong one. Put simply, the burqa conveys the idea that women have to carry the burden of morality in society. Yet, are we to promote the active suppression of choice to rally against a supposed symbol of suppression? I think not. Liberalism stands for a state in which humans are free and equal, so that any limitation of this freedom and equality stands in need of justification. J.S Mill’s classic statement on freedom dictates that where no one else is harmed, a person’s right to self-determination is unconditional. As Mill had it “The only part of the conduct of any one, for which he is amenable to society is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute.” The Western world’s alienation from Islamic culture allows them to stereotype the burqa as inevitably oppressive while the fact is that some women actively choose to cover themselves and strange as it may seem, find it empowering. The burqa is a dangerous tool of repression where it is made compulsory as is the case in many parts of Saudi Arabia, however the principle of obligation and enforcement stands in breach of liberalism more acutely than the dress itself. In a culture such as ours, it is difficult determine whether a woman has chosen to cover herself or whether she is being forced to do so. As the prominent American philosopher, Martha Nussbaum, argues, choices are distorted by “adaptation to (and even eroticisation of) a state of affairs in which men’s desire for control governs the course of life.” Yet, in circumstances in which women explicitly say they want to be covered, head to toe, skepticism about their choices does seem like a curiously illiberal direction for liberalism to head in. Sure, we can try to change another person’s mind, but we cannot coerce or harass them on matters which can reasonably be called private, even if it goes against what the majority in the community feel is ‘right’. It is important to differentiate between ‘speaking as a woman’ and ‘speaking for women’ as the first type of discourse is based on the principle of essentialism which presupposes that all women have similar needs, desires and opinions. The ban on the burqa epitomizes ‘speaking for women’ by perpetuating the idea that the burqa is oppressive for all women and must be prohibited, undermining personal choice and the right to self-determination. Former French president Nicholas Sarkozy’s statement that the “the burqa is not a sign of religion, it is a sign of subservience” is reminiscent of a fundamentalist’s proclamation that a bikini is surely an indication of immodesty. What is missing in such discourses on modesty and oppression is the voice of the wearer, the woman, the one who should ultimately decide what, if anything, her clothes stand for.

The attempt to regulate how women adorn their bodies is a way of strengthening patriarchal authority. As a feminist, liberal and a woman, but more so, as a human being, I believe that my body belongs only to me. While I do not advocate the burqa or support any other symbolic manifestation of oppression, I do believe that women have a right to choose to wear the burqa - or whatever else they wish to wear.

The writer is a staff member of Pakistan Today and holds a degree from Mount Holyoke College.

http://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/columns/
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Protecting women from domestic abuse

By Samira ShacklePublished:
March 31, 2013

Last week, I visited the Acid Survivors Foundation in Islamabad. Acid attacks, in which acid or other corrosive substances are thrown at someone, with the intent to disfigure, are a particularly brutal form of gender-based violence. And it is, on the large, gender based. While men are occasionally attacked, the vast majority of the victims are women and the vast majority of perpetrators are men. A significant proportion of cases take place within the context of domestic violence. In the last two years, aided in part by the Oscar-winning documentary Saving Face, as well as by the tireless efforts of committed lawmakers and activists, awareness of acid attacks has risen sharply. But, as the co-director of the Acid Survivors Foundation told me last week, acid attacks may be the most horrific form of gender-based violence, they are certainly not the most prevalent. Indeed, campaigners say that it is impossible to take serious steps forward on eliminating acid violence without tackling the broader issue of domestic, gender-based violence alongside it.
The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines domestic violence as “the inflicting of physical injury by one family or household member on another; also: a repeated or habitual pattern of such behaviour.” Usually, though not always, this is violence by men against women. A 1999 report by Human Rights Watch estimated that somewhere between 70 and 90 per cent of women in Pakistan will suffer some form of spousal abuse. An academic study in 2007 found that 5,000 women die every year in domestic incidents, while thousands more are killed or maimed. At the most extreme end of the spectrum are acid attacks, burnings, and honour killings. But at the other end are beatings which do not require hospitalisation, psychological torment, and other forms of daily abuse. For many women, this is the norm, and they have nowhere to run to. In general, people at all levels of the criminal justice system view domestic violence as a private matter that does not belong in the courts. The police frequently respond to such complaints by encouraging the two parties to reconcile, rather than arresting and investigating the perpetrator. The few women who are examined by doctors, as part of a criminal investigation, face scepticism from physicians who should be neutral.

There is no real impetus for the police, lawyers and doctors to change the way they view domestic violence, because Pakistani law does not criminalise it. In 2009, the Domestic Violence (Prevention and Protection) Bill was passed unanimously by the National Assembly. Supported by President Asif Ali Zardari and the prime minister at the time, Yousaf Raza Gilani, it defined domestic violence as “all intentional acts of gender-based or other physical or psychological abuse committed by an accused against women, children or other vulnerable persons, with whom the accused person is or has been in a domestic relationship.” However, the bill lapsed after the Senate failed to pass it within the required three months. It was opposed by Islamist parties in the upper house, some of whom had been urged to do so by ministers who privately disagreed with the bill. The Council of Islamic Ideology said that the bill would increase the number of divorces and said that the punishments laid out in the bill were already enacted by other laws.

In 2012, it was tabled again and it looked as if it was going to be passed. But, despite the tireless efforts of female MNAs like Yasmeen Rehman and Attiya Inayatullah to win over the support of the religious right, these parties continued to oppose the law change. The Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) said that the domestic violence bill undermined Islamic values, and “promote[d] western culture”. They were not alone. “We cannot let the government legalise anti-Islamic values in the name of so-called rhetoric of women’s emancipation,” said Qari Hanif Jalandhry, a cleric with Wafaq-ul-Madaris Al-Arabia Pakistan. The deadlock persisted and the law was not passed, except in Islamabad Capital Territory.

Why does this matter? As women activists pointed out, it was a relatively soft bill, carrying sentences ranging from just three months to three years. On top of this, there is the fact that a raft of pro-women legislation introduced in recent years frequently goes unenforced due to a lack of accountability and entrenched misogynistic attitudes at ground level. However, these factors do not change the fact that the law is an important point from which to start. Defining something as a crime takes it out of the private sphere and into the public one. It is no longer something to be dealt with quietly behind closed doors, but is recalibrated as an appropriate matter for the police and the courts to investigate. Defining what is right and what is wrong by law is a vital means by which a society says what is acceptable and what isn’t. For many women, domestic abuse is such a normal feature of daily life as to be unremarkable. Criminalising such violence would not change attitudes and eliminate it overnight, but it would give some basis from which to change the attitudes of both battered women and their abusers. There is something inherently flawed about the logic of the JUI-F and other right-wing religious groups tying domestic abuse to Islamic values. A higher instance of domestic violence may be noted in traditional, patriarchal societies, but this does not mean that it should be defended as some form of religious freedom.

The election campaign is heating up. Given that women are an under-represented group at the ballot box, it seems unlikely that any of the major parties will include a commitment on gender-based violence in their manifestos. But make no mistake — this is not a personal issue, it is a political one. A 2011 Thomson Reuters survey ranked Pakistan as the third-most dangerous country in the world for women, after Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. We can only hope that the next parliament builds upon the progress already made and makes serious efforts to work against this silent menace.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 1st, 2013.
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Eradicating poverty through women empowerment
Riaz Missen

The UNDP’s Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) report of the outgoing year claims achieving remarkable results worldwide vis-à-vis reducing extreme poverty, enhancing primary school enrolment of girls and bringing down child and maternal mortality but equally highlights the challenge ahead: “Lack of safe sanitation hampering progress in health and nutrition, biodiversity loss continues apace, and greenhouse gas emissions continue to pose a major threat to people and ecosystems”.

The report, which carried on its title page the photograph female brick-kiln workers, said the economic slowdown in the developed world must not be allowed to decelerate or reverse the progress that has been made. Terming eradication of inequality and pressing on food security, gender equality, maternal health, rural development, infrastructure and environmental sustainability, and responses to climate change as the longstanding goals, it emphasizes on the role of governments, civil society and private sector in this regard.

Even governments around the world achieve the targets set for 2015, more than 600 million people will still be using unsafe drinking water, one billion living under and around poverty line, mothers continuing to die needlessly in childbirth, and children suffering and dyeing from preventable diseases.
Ban Ki-moon, the Secretary General UN, noted in the preface of the report that eradicating hunger and ensuring that all children complete their primary education were the targets that remained unfulfilled. “Achieving the MDGs depends so much on women’s empowerment and equal access by women to education, work, health care and decision-making,” he added while pointing out unevenness of progress within countries and regions, and the severe inequalities among populations, especially between rural and urban areas.
Pakistan may not be standing at par with many developing countries, which are fortunate enough to have peaceful neighborhood and have no ideological burdens to carry. Still, what has been done here amidst all the chaos and anarchy following the War on Terror, both on its western border and its soil, is nothing less than miraculous.

Those most amazing aspect of Islamabad’s efforts vis-à-vis eradicating extreme poverty from its soil, though the funds and resources dedicated to this cause are far lesser than rooting out militancy, constitutes adopting the strategy to this end suggested by UN Secretary General. During last five years has shown enough progress on empowering women as a means to achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

The political leadership of the country, which had jointly struggled to restore democracy through peaceful means, also took care of the people duly affected by international economic recession and the War on Terror through establishing Benazir Income Support Program (BISP) as an independent authority - patronized by President and Prime Minister and managed by a high powered Board headed by its Chairperson -through the Act of the Parliament in 2010.

Dedicating its social safety net to a female political leader, who was assassinated by extremists, gave a clear message to the world, in and around, that political leadership across the divide was as united in favor of the underprivileged section of the society as it was opposed to religious extremism. More, the program is also being led by a female politician, Farzana Raja, who has earned lot of praise as well as assistance from international donors for running the program efficiently and honestly - she is spending only 30% available resources on running the administration.

BISP conducted countrywide Poverty Survey/Census for the first time and collected the data of 27 million households. The poverty census completed in record time of one year across all Pakistan including Azad Jammu & Kashmir, Gilgit-Baltistan and FATA. The allocation for the financial year 2012-13 is Rs 70 billion to provide cash assistance to 5.5 million families, which constitutes almost 18% of the entire population. The Program aims to cover almost 40% of the population below the poverty line. Recently the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has agreed to give BISP $200 million to bring the left-outs into its social safety net.

More than 7 million beneficiary families have been identified through Poverty Scorecard Survey for disbursing Rs1000/month through ‘branchless banking system’ (Smart Card, Mobile Phone, and Debit Card). Called as Martial Plan and having focus on poverty alleviation through empowering the women, more than Rs146 billion has been disbursed to the deserving and needy of the country with complete transparency in about 4 years time through the elected representatives of the people, regardless of their party affiliation.

To make people independent financially rather than perpetually depending on government support, BISP is providing interest free loans up to Rs 300,000 to help recipients set up small businesses. The most striking feature of this program is that the female beneficiary is the sole owner/proprietor of the business and the counseling, monitoring and training for starting the business is provided through Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund (PPAF).

A total of 10,000 young males and females have been trained and another 20,000 are currently undergoing training. The target is to train 150,000 students every year. Pakistan is also providing through its social safety net insurance cover of Rs.100, 000 in the case of the death of the bread earner of the poor family registered with the authority. With a view that health shocks are the major reason for pushing people below the poverty line, Rs25000 health insurance is being provided to the poorest families for the first time in Pakistan. Pilot phase has been launched from Faisalabad.

Finally, as the Poverty Survey had indicated, millions of poor children never attend any school due to financial limitations. Waseela-e-Taleem Program has been initiated with generous help of the World Bank and DFID, to send 3 million children to school through additional cash incentives of Rs.200 per child. “The BISP was designed to alleviate the poverty through empowerment of women in the country, and, in addition, it is helping to materialize the dream of making Pakistan a welfare state,” a top official of the BISP says, adding that the work of 15 years has been done in just four-and-a-half years, and if the program continues for other 10 years, it would help reduce poverty across Pakistan by 10 per cent.

http://www.thefrontierpost.com/category/40/
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