Nivatiti is one of our interns for this year 2007. She comes from Uganda and has a degree on Law from Makerere University, Kampala. Her major interst has been wome’s role in the peace process of Uganda. I decided to include one of her articles here to give you a feel of what she means.
WOMEN’S ESSENTIAL ROLE IN PEACE BUIDING.
Women must take the leadership role in conflict resolution and peacemaking, not only to protect themselves and their children from immediate war dangers and its effects of internal and external displacement and insecurity, but because they are the ones, individually and collectively, who have the potential to save future generations. It is the duty and obligation of all humanity to enable them to do so.
Zerfinesh Ketsella Bendow, Deputy Regional Director, UNICEF Eastern Africa Regional Office (ESARO) Nairobi 1994.
Women represent an untapped resource in peace building. Stereotypical images of women as passive victims of war overshadow their agency and contributions to peace building, and belie the complex reality of women’s experiences in conflict situations. In 2000, the UN Security Council reaffirmed the essential role that women play in peace-building in its historic Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security. Defining women by their biological roles is problematic and gives rise to gender inequality and the oppression of women in society. In today’s conflicts, more than 70 % of the casualties are civilians, most of them women and children. Women face specific and devastating forms of violence related to gender, including rape as a weapon of war and sexual slavery, practices that in turn greatly increase their vulnerability to HIV/AIDS.
Women as care givers and peace makers they are the first to be affected by infrastructure breakdown like in Somalia, and may be forced to adopt survival strategies that involve their exploitation. In the Eastern Africa Sub region, women have recognised that peace and security issues have become inextricably and intertwined for development. Women too the front lines urging for the end to conflicts through peace talks, signing peace accords, peace campaigns and providing support that allows their families and communities to survive, however they have remained in the periphery of formal peace and reconstruction processes. It has been recognised that for a sustainable peace to be successful, women must take up an equal role in shaping decisions in their country. Women’s’ perspectives and experiences are critical to stability and development for inclusive governance. Recovery, disarmament and rehabilitation provide a chance to strengthen gender justice through the formulation of laws, judicial systems and political processes that uphold women’s equality for instance in the Gacaca courts in Rwanda.
Women activists in Rwanda have strongly lobbied to produce Constitutional guarantees for women’s participation in peace-building. After the Kigali Declaration, women ex-combatants have been demobilized through forming “Ndabanga Association”, an association of women ex-combatants to develop new ties with the Rwanda Demobilisation and Reintegration Commission for systematically reintegration processes.
Due to genocide and massacres that destroyed the Rwanda social bond, women groups from all ethnicities, refugees and returnees came together to reflect on the way forward to create a favourable environment for a fair society where lasting peace reigns, recognition and respect of human rights for national building. Rwandanese women have developed strong networks among which is Profemme Twesehamwe a network of 48 Organisations which advocates for the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women. The Association of Genocide Widows (AVEGA) empowers widows to deal with their past experiences and to rebuild their shattered lives. They have been engaged in small income generating activities like making “peace baskets” for sale to generate income for their families.
In the absence of formal peace processes, women’s groups have embarked on individual diplomacy by reaching out to each other across the lines of conflict and ethnicity to enable peaceful co-existence. They have built mutual trust and found unity in working together on women’s human rights issues, and have supported each other in fostering peace within their communities.
In light of this, women have resorted to making significant contributions towards the culture of peace. They are largely known to be responsible for nurturing positive cultural practices and they offer non-violence skills in conflict situation. Although women are less visible than men, they should be involved in seeking solutions to issues that are intrinsic to peace building, sustainable economic and political development for national building.
