PRESS BRIEFING BY UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT FUND FOR WOMEN
Press Briefing
PRESS BRIEFING BY UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT FUND FOR WOMEN
19961029
FOR INFORMATION OF UNITED NATIONS SECRETARIAT ONLY
"Whether we come from Somalia, New York, Paris or Cairo, we are more alike than we are unalike", American poet Maya Angelou told correspondents this afternoon at a Headquarters press briefing. The briefing was held by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) as it celebrated 20 years of achievement for the women of the world.
Ms. Angelou, who was today appointed National Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), will moderate UNIFEM's award presentation this afternoon, at which three grass-roots women's organizations will be recognized for significantly improving the lives of women in their countries. She said all women were struggling for a place in the sun, to have some control over their lives.
At the briefing, UNIFEM Director Noeleen Heyzer introduced representatives of the three women's organizations to be honoured: Maria del Carmen Ramirez of Los Molineras, an organization of women millers in Peru; Rekha Dubey of the Centre for Social Research, an Indian non-governmental organization working for women's rights; and Nasri Hussein Adam of Iida, a women's development group in Somalia which includes women from all Somali clans.
Ms. Heyzer said the achievement awards represented a celebration of "ordinary women as extraordinary heros". The UNIFEM looked at women who had struggled to transform their lives and the lives of their families and communities. Each of the honorees had turned their struggle into inspiration and empowerment, for themselves and the people in their communities.
Women had a high stake in creating new forms of partnerships and processes to bring about change, whether they and their children suffered most from bad government, poverty, violent conflict or war, she said. The UNIFEM's projects and the women with whom it worked were committed to enhancing quality of life. The recipients of today's awards had improved the lives of women in the community, the country and the family. The UNIFEM had supported each of those organizations.
She said Los Molineras, represented by Ms. Ramirez, had won UNIFEM's "Food Technology Contest" as one of the best small rural businesses in the Andean region. It was made up of women who had revitalized a traditional food source, bringing food security to a region that had known hunger and poverty, creating jobs for women and building a model business that could be recreated in the rural areas. The project had helped people to see the potential of
local grains, local products and foods, and had encouraged them to use those products with creative technology to attain higher standards of living. That was economic empowerment at its best.
Ms. Dubey, of the Centre for Social Research, had worked hard to build networks between village and community leaders to increase women's awareness of their rights and to help women build a greater role in decision-making, Ms. Heyzer said. She had overcome great personal difficulties due to an early marriage, domestic violation, separation from her children and loss of her home. Through the work of the Centre, she had become an organizer and a local political leader.
Ms. Adam, of Iida, had been involved in mobilizing women to advocate for peace and dialogue among the warring factions in Somalia, Ms. Heyzer went on to say. She had left a safe life in Kenya to volunteer for work with Iida, which provided housing counselling, education, training and jobs for women displaced by war and victimized by violence and rape. By promoting the role of women in peace-building and conflict prevention, Iida was committed to the integration of Somali women in the reconstruction and rehabilitation process.
What was UNIFEM's role in the organizations being honoured? a correspondent asked. What would have happened without UNIFEM's support? Ms. Heyzer said the organizations needed funding, technical capacity and partnership with UNIFEM in order to move forward. They needed a larger context in which to place their initiatives and UNIFEM provided that.
Ms. Ramirez said she would have organized even without UNIFEM, because she has always been a local leader, but UNIFEM had helped to make the organization more stable. They had begun with simple technology and UNIFEM had provided technical assistance and funding to help them improve. Through their participation in UNIFEM's contest, they had achieved national and now international recognition.
Ms. Dubey said that in a society where the status of women was so low that they were confined to the four walls of their home, UNIFEM had given women strength and self-awareness, increasing their self-esteem, self-worth and confidence. Through training and seminars, she had she had learned that women could be empowered. She felt empowered, and it had made a tremendous difference in her life and, through her, in the lives of other women. They had demanded and received seats for women in the local village councils and were now working to win places in the two house of Parliament.
Ms. Adam said that during the Somalia conflict, the men made the decisions. They decided where to fight, and it was the women and children who had to flee. The men were so loyal to their clan that they disregarded the family, leaving the women to take care of everything. As it attempted to help women, Iida had realized that little could be done without peace. The UNIFEM
UNIFEM Briefing - 3 - 29 October 1996
had given Somali women an opportunity to come together, share their experiences and search for solutions, to discuss peace and development in their communities and in partnership with the men. Through UNIFEM, Iida had been given skills that helped it to involve both women and men and to encourage them to find ways on a local level to attain peace.
The Somali women were united because, as women, they did not have a tribe. "You do not belong anywhere, you are just a women", Ms. Adam said. She cited an example in which an aid worker had been kidnapped. An Iida worker knew the wife of the militia chief of the group who was holding the young man captive. The wife then pressured her husband to release the worker. This was an example of finding alternative solutions to problems in the conflict. When they came together as women, the clan issue did not appear. There was no barrier.
Ms. Heyzer said that UNIFEM tried to build people-to-people contacts in war-torn countries. Women had the bonds and links in which zones of peace could be created.
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