I am highly elated that three women human rights activists who have selflessly struggled to fight for women’s rights and to promote peace have been recognized by the Nobel Prize Committee with the award of the Nobel Peace Prize for 2011. As the award committee chairman, Thorbjoern Jagland said, “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.” In other words, recognition of the role of women and education of women is very key to realizing the achievement of this expectation. If you educate a man you educate an individual, but if you educate a woman you educate a family (nation). Congratulations and more encouragement to women activists.
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| The 20011 joint Nobel Peace Prize winners from left to right: Leymah Gbowee (Liberian civil society activist), Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (Liberian President) and Tawakul Karman (Civil society activist of Yemen) |
They were the first women to win the prize since Kenya’s Wangari Maathai, who died last month, was named as the laureate in 2004. The award seemed designed to give impetus to the cause for women’s rights around the world.
Herein is brief profile of the three remarkable women activists:
PRRESIDENT ELLEN JOHNSON SIRLEAF
Johnson Sirleaf and her Unity Party won the presidential run-off in 2005 to become the 24th President of the oldest independent African nation, Liberia.In the 1997 Liberian elections she ran second to warlord-turned-president and war crimes suspect,Charles Taylor, who many claimed was voted into power by a fearful electorate.Although she lost by a landslide, she rose to national prominence and earned the nickname “Iron Lady.” She was named President in the 2005 presidential election and took office on 16 January 2006.It was a time Liberia had come through 14 years of war and her rule has brought sustained peace. She says does not “want Africa to return to the men’s club” and forecast that women would take over in more African countries. Sirleaf is the first and currently only elected female head of state in Africa.She hopes “it will definitely happen in other countries because many women are now vying for the presidency, which didn’t happen much in the past”.
Herein is brief profile of the three remarkable women activists:
PRRESIDENT ELLEN JOHNSON SIRLEAF
Seventy-two year old Mrs. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf was born on 29 October 1938. Her ethnic background is 1/2 Gola from her father's side, and ¼ German (grandfather) and 1/4 Kru (grandmother) from her mother's side. Sirleaf was born in Monrovia and studied economics and accounts from 1948 to 1955 at the College of West Africa in Monrovia. She married James Sirleaf when she was 17 years old, and then traveled with him to the United States in 1961 to continue her studies and earned an accounting degree at Madison Business College, in Madison, Wisconsin, and a degree in economics from the University of Colorado, Boulder. Sirleaf later studied economics and public policy at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government from 1969 to 1971, gaining a Master of Public Administration. She then returned to her native Liberia to work under the government of William Tolbert.
Johnson Sirleaf and her Unity Party won the presidential run-off in 2005 to become the 24th President of the oldest independent African nation, Liberia.In the 1997 Liberian elections she ran second to warlord-turned-president and war crimes suspect,Charles Taylor, who many claimed was voted into power by a fearful electorate.Although she lost by a landslide, she rose to national prominence and earned the nickname “Iron Lady.” She was named President in the 2005 presidential election and took office on 16 January 2006.It was a time Liberia had come through 14 years of war and her rule has brought sustained peace. She says does not “want Africa to return to the men’s club” and forecast that women would take over in more African countries. Sirleaf is the first and currently only elected female head of state in Africa.She hopes “it will definitely happen in other countries because many women are now vying for the presidency, which didn’t happen much in the past”.
Ms. TAWAKUL KARMAN
Ms. Tawakul Karman is a 32-year-old mother of three. Tawakul Karman is from Taiz, a city in southern Yemen that is a hotbed of resistance against President Saleh’s regime, and now lives in the capital, Sanaa. She is a journalist and member of Islah, an Islamic party. Her father is a former legal affairs minister under Saleh. She has long been an advocate for human rights and freedom of expression in Yemen. Her arrest in January 2011 incensed many people and is credited by some analysts in Yemen with starting the widespread protests that have convulsed the impoverished land since then. Some of her supporters have labelled her “The Mother of Revolution.”. She heads a human rights advocacy group called Women Journalists Without Chains. Karman has been campaigning to remove Saleh from power since 2006 and mounted an initiative to organize Yemeni youth groups and opposition into a national council. Head of the human rights group Women Journalists without Chains, Karmen said “I give the prize to the youth of revolution in Yemen and the Yemeni people.”
Ms. LEYMAH GBOWEE
Leymah Gbowee was born in central Liberia in 1972. At the age of
17, she relocated to Monrovia, when the First Liberian Civil War
erupted. She trained as a trauma counsellor during the civil war
in Liberia and worked with the ex-child soldiers of Charles
Taylor’s army. Surrounded by the images of war, she realized that
"if any changes were to be made in society it had to be by the
mothers". She is a mother of six.
Leymah Gbowee organised a group of Christian and Muslim women to
challenge Liberia’s warlords. She was honoured for mobilizing women “across ethnic and religious dividing lines to bring an end to the 14-year long war in Liberia, and to ensure women’s participation in elections.” She trained as a trauma counsellor during the civil war in Liberia and worked with the ex-child soldiers of Charles Taylor’s army. Surrounded by the images of war, she realized that “if any changes were to be made in society it had to be by the mothers.”Gbowee then led a delegation of Liberian women to Ghana to continue to apply pressure on the warring factions during the peace process. They staged a silent protest outside the President-ial Palace in Accra, bringing about an agreement during the stalled peace talks.Leymah Gbowee and Comfort Freeman, presidents of two different Lutheran churches, organized the Women in Peacebuilding Network (WIPNET), and issued a statement of intent to the President: "In the past we were silent, but after being killed, raped, dehumanized, and infected with diseases, and watching our children and families destroyed, war has taught us that the future lies in saying NO to violence and YES to peace! We will not relent until peace prevails."
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