My Dream for Women
By: Fanael Alemayehu
Aug 16,2007
San Francisco, USA
There is a lot of excitement going on for the upcoming celebration of the Ethiopian Millennium. As we approach this milestone, we must address the issues that are hindering our country’s progress; one of which is the lack of empowering women. Current world population stands, approximately at 6.6 billion, comprising 3.3 billion men and 3.28 billion women. As we can see, there are only 44 million more men than women according to this global census data. Because this difference is so small compared to the total number of the population, statistically speaking, we can safely conclude that the number of men is equal to the number of women. However, while the numerical breakdown of men and women looks naturally balanced, we see an unnatural dominance by men in every walk of life in every part of the world.
EMPOWERING WOMEN
This biased and lopsided dominance has been instituted for centuries and taken for granted as a just and correct norm of life, especially in Ethiopian culture. Weighed against this vivid and glaringly unjust backdrop our dream for this new millennium should be to empower our women in order to strengthen our culture, and together, men and women, lead our country in a better and more unified direction, wherein both genders will contribute their share towards sustainable development to extricate themselves from the grinding & excruciating poverty that has become the hallmark of today’s Ethiopia.
There are many instances that exemplify the oppression of women; but I have reminisced one very profound example that portrays this issue. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and one day, as I was surfing the internet, I ran across an article about the G8 summit which is an official forum of the Heads of the leading industrialized democracies. This forum was designed to harmonize attitudes of acute international problems. Along with the article was a picture of the 26 Heads of some countries of the world. In this picture, there are 25 men and only one woman; yes, only one woman standing alone in the middle. This picture speaks volumes about the representation of women. Seeing this picture, I wondered why there weren’t 2, 3, 4…13 women and 13 men? Fathers, brothers and husbands, I am talking about your mothers, sisters, wives and daughters; this matter affects everyone. I ask the men of my country to help each of the women in their lives rise until they are equal, and to support them so that sometime soon, we can see as many women as men representing our country in top leadership positions.
Empowering women goes hand in hand with other ills we are trying to eradicate. Ethiopia currently has given the priority to do away with poverty, once and for all, and in this fight inclusion of women helps this huge task ease. There are noticeable signs where Ethiopia seems to include women in some major positions. On the other hand, one finds it surprising to note that women’s participation in leadership and administrative levels is higher in the underdeveloped world than in the industrialized world. Nevertheless, contrary to my knowledge based on my close observation of the seventeen-year struggle of the TPLF, I have to witness that women’s participation is lower now than what it was during the heydays of the armed struggle. During the armed political struggle there was quite a significant number of women fighters and as we have heard they were as brave as their brothers to say the list. But now there are no women in the polit-bureau of the TPLF and also out of the Forty Five members of its Central Committee only nine of them are women. The same is true in the Ethiopian parliament, out of the five hundred forty seven or so members only Forty Eight are women. This is as bad as the G8 picture.
ORDEAL OF LABOR
I wouldn’t be mistaken if I say that we live in a world where everything, including matters, that concern women is decided by men. So far in the world we have mainly seen from the perspective of men. Let us see what the world looks like when the women’s perspective is included. Yes there are many men who think they can represent women and know what is good for women. This is like a man understanding how painful it is to give birth. A man can anticipate, but he can’t say for sure the extent of the pain. Because he has not experienced the pain first hand; to say “Yes! It hurts”. Only a woman who has gone through the piercing ordeal of labor would only understand the pain. Therefore, it goes with out saying that, instead of a man representing her, she should represent herself. After all, she is the one who knows her needs first hand.
What we have to do to change the current situation of women in Ethiopia is not different from any other part of the world; and I am not suggesting that we should just raise our hands and proclaim equality for women. I am suggesting that a process has to start and start now. It is a process that must start with men to change the way they see the role of the mother, the sister, the wife and the daughter in society. The world has seen some women leaders. For example India and England had women prime ministers, and also Israel, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Liberia had or still have women leaders. While the fundamental problem of men’s dominance still remains, to see a woman in leadership position also proves that women can perform in their assigned duty as well as men.
And to my fellow women, stand up today for your rights and equality. There is no free lunch. We have to work hard to get where we want to be. The sky is the limit. Remember, nobody is going to fight for us. We have to want to be equal. It has to come from within us in order for us to achieve it. We must work hand in hand with our men. As they say in Ethiopia, “Be ande ij ayachebechebum.” We need two hands to clap. Let’s not put the blame squarely on men. Remember, they are also victims of society that nurtures both sexes. This domination of women by men, is relayed from generation to generation. So let us walk this walk together with the men. We have to work with each other not against each other. We can’t just give in and wait for a miracle to happen. It’s all the outcome of long struggle and perseverance. For example, American women started voting in 1920 long after the black man who was liberated from slavery and was enjoying the right to vote. It took a long struggle for women to be able to vote in par.
And now, as we all know after a long struggle, there is a woman running for presidency. “Kes be kes, enkulal be egru yehedal.” Slowly but surely, they came to this point which is the fruit of many years of struggle. It is heart warming to state that today in America, there are more women than men attending colleges. This instance shows that women are on the right track to empower themselves which is good news and encourages women in Ethiopia and elsewhere.
THE LITTLE ENGINE
There is a good story that I used to tell my daughters when they were little, and now I remind them every now and then when they need encouragement. It is titled, “The Little Engine That Could.” There was a little engine that did light work in the station; One day the big engine that used to transport passengers was broken. There was only this little engine that was available to push the train. The passengers asked that little engine to push the big engine. At first, the little engine said, “I can’t possibly push that big engine,” but the passengers insisted on and pressured the little engine to help. Finally the little engine agreed to push the big engine. In the beginning it was too hard, but the little engine kept saying to itself, “I think I can! I think I can!” and it pushed with its might. Finally, the little engine pushed the big train, which it thought it could never do.
If we have determination and perseverance, we can do anything we set our minds to do. We can achieve this by arming ourselves with education. Ladies, let’s not limit ourselves. We can be the prime minister, the engineer, the doctor, etc. the Sky is the limit. Our equality will not be handed out to us. Therefore, we have to earn it by working together with men and ultimately transform our society to accord us with the opportunity of a fair and even playing field.
HALF BAKED
And now my challenge to the Ethiopian government is that along with the campaign to eradicate poverty to also teach the importance of empowering women and to start the process of changing the current mentality of the dominating male, it is to the benefit of everyone to unfetter half of the population from the multi-faceted traditional bondages that have kept the womanhood in perpetual hostage. Time and again, it has been seen that society pays dearly for the ills of ignorance. Encourage parents to send their daughters to school instead of having them wed at their young age. A vigorous and bold campaign by the government certainly speeds up the empowerment of women. Women and men have equal responsibility to change the current situation.
The empowerment of women must be pivotal in this millennium. We cannot prosper when only one of the genders in society dominates everything. Half of the tree is green and the other half is welting; therefore, we have to take care of the other half for the tree to produce a healthy fruit. The matter is very crucial for the men who think it’s acceptable for this to continue. It is essential that they change their way of thinking about women and the place they hold in society. We can no longer put this matter in the back burner. Let us put it on the forefront and deal with it once and for all. Women and men of Ethiopia, fathers, brothers, and husbands, help our dreams for the millennium come true. Help us change that G8 and the Ethiopian parliament pictures to a beautiful and colorful picture that includes as many women as there are men so that we can see a new perspective of the world. Let us see the outcome of women and men working together to bring about equality, prosperity, peace, and harmony to the world in general and to our country Ethiopia in particular during the new millennium.