Catégorie : 1000 women Peace Nobel 2005

Linked with Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan – KMVS.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Hakkuben Theba was born in 1966 into a poor farming family from the highly conservative Theba community in Gujarat. Her journey, from a destitute widow to a community leader and a trainer of leaders, was arduous. In the past 15 years, this woman has inspired more than 3000 women to become active members of a women’s collective. Gradually, Hakkuben and her colleagues have changed the nature of the village through women’s empowerment, generating alternative sources of income during drought, and ecological regeneration.

She says: « I would like to create a platform for the next generation of women so that they can learn from our experience and their life becomes easier ».

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Hakkuben Theba – India

She works for Saiyerejo Sangathan (not on the internet).

Hakkuben Theba (born 1966), from Dador in Gujarat, is a rural farmer from a marginalized family involved in dry farming (rain-dependent and prone to crop failure) and animal husbandry.

Dry farming is characteristic of the region, which is both drought-prone and suffers from high groundwater salinity. She belongs to the Theba, a small, conservative Muslim community. They marry their daughters within the community, are very proud of their culture and heritage, and do not encourage or practice dowry. This is one of the many reasons why there is absolutely no case of domestic violence, another being that people from the community do not drink alcohol. They are close-knit, usually frowning upon women and girls working outside the home.

Hakkuben was a farmer herself before her parents married her off at the age of 14. Since then, she has given birth to three boys and a girl, of whom only a boy and the girl survive. She was widowed in 1998, and her brother-in-law and his wife encouraged her to make an effort to be financially independent. This is when she came into contact with, and joined, the Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan KMVS, which had been working in the area since 1991–92.

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Linked with Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan – KMVS.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

For 15 years, Lataben Sachde (born 1963) has been working with elected women, and studying their perspective on good governance. The change her leadership has brought about is evident in the way that women leaders execute their positional power in their respective villages. i.e., responsibly. An estimated 500 « leaders » have stepped out of their restrictive social mores, challenging the patriarchal setup. Lataben and her team are the quiet force that has initiated a powerful grassroots movement of women claiming their public spaces.

She says: « I am hopeful that in the next ten to fifteen years, women will be more actively involved in the ‘governance movement’ and that it will translate from paper to reality. My role will be to provide as much information to as many women as I can ».

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Lataben Sachde – India

She works for the Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan KMVS.

Lataben’s specialty lies in interacting with women who have been elected, and understanding their perspective on what comprises good governance.

Lataben Sachde was born in 1963 into a lower-middleclass family from a village close to Bhuj in Gujarat’s Kutch district. After completing her higher secondary school, she had to give up studying, as she was married into a traditional family.

She began working with the Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan (KMVS) a little over 14 years ago. Her husband’s friend came to know about KMVS, and that it was looking for a local woman who could work with the community. Lataben was initially not too keen on taking on the responsibility, but her husband encouraged her to at least give it a shot. He supported her quietly through the difficult days that followed her decision to join.

Over the years, she has had to struggle with her in-laws’ opposition to her work in an unconventional environment. She also had to overcome her own lack of exposure and specific educational skills within the organization. Today, Lataben is one of the leaders of the KVMS.

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Linked with Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan KMVS.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Alkaben Jani’s work in the Kutch area of Gujarat is informed by her intimate knowledge of the oppressive social fabric of the region. For the past 15 years, she has been extensively organizing, mobilizing, and training rural women, focusing on capacity-building and leadership training. The result of these efforts is the emergence of a strong and motivated team of 12,712 leaders at the community level, who are leading other women in the area to surface and take the reins both in their homes and outside.

She says: « The human sea is full of pearls that need to be identified and polished so as to give them the shine. I was identified and groomed and now I feel it is my moral responsibility to groom the rest ».

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Alkaben Jani – India

She works for Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan KMVS.

Alkaben Jani (born 1964) is a single woman who has had to struggle against family expectations and pressures to pursue her convictions and work with women less privileged than her. She hails from a middleclass Kutchi Brahmin family. Her father, a manager in a cotton company, had passed high school, and her mother had studied up to grade VII. The couple had three daughters and three sons, five of whom are, at the least, graduates. Alkaben is a postgraduate, having completed her Masters in Commerce.

She was in Kutch until the age of seven, and then her father was transferred to Karnataka, where she completed her education. Alkaben’s background, therefore, is a mixed-urban culture. She returned to Kutch as soon as she completed her university education, and joined a school as a teacher. She realized soon, though, that she was compromising heavily on her values and principles.

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « Do not dismay. For the life of the women, not even one step backwards will be taken ».

A woman of contrasts. Brave in confronting struggles. Sympathetic. Wise. Serene, as she meditates on what to do. Of solid principles and strong roots. An Ambassador of Conscience. Gentle like the breeze. Persistent. Disapproving of exaggeration. A life full of obstacles in the search for justice. 61 years of hard work against the current tide. Hilda Marina Morales Trujillo, Guatemalan, dreams of a world with equal opportunities for women and men.

She says also: « I saw that women did not have much support to gain access to justice. There were no women’s shelters, which are indispensable, otherwise they have to go back home, where they might suffer even more violence. People used to say that the legislation was advanced, but, in fact, it discriminated women ».

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Hilda Marina Morales Trujillo – Guatemala

She is a University professor in Family Law and Human Rights. She drew up the academic basis for the Diploma in Gender Studies and the Post graduate Certificate in Women’s Rights for the University of San Carlos de Guatemala, where she holds the post of head professor of that subject. She also teaches at the University of Rafael Landívar.

Hilda Marina Morales Trujillo was born in a poor home in the Petén province of Guatemala, on the border with Mexico. Her mother, housewife, dressmaker, owner of a bazar; her father: agriculturist. Hilda has become independent thanks to her mother’s example and her father’s approval.

She was initially a primary school teacher. During her time at university studying law, she became aware of the problem of mistreated women. “Nowadays, you hear about it, but in those days you did not hear so much. Then, women who were victims of violence and slanders had no alternatives”.

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Linked with Center for Social Development CSD.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Chea Vannath (born 1948) is President of the Center for Social Development CSD, which promotes school curricula on transparency, monitors the courts and parliament and organizes public debates on the Khmer Rouge tribunal, corruption and other issues. After the Khmer Rouge seized power in 1975, Chea was forced to work in labor camps before escaping to Thailand and on to the US. After living as a refugee in America for more than ten years, she returned to Cambodia in 1992 to participate in rebuilding her country.

She says: « Not anymore will I allow only one party to lead my country ».

She says also: « “He (my father) was committed, had tremendous energy and effort, and possessed a progressive vision. He did not blame others. When he talked, he made me think. Once he was asked by other villagers while we were forced to work in the field by the Khmer Rouge, how it feels to not be rich anymore, and he replied that he still felt very fortunate. He did not pay attention to money but to human beings”.

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Chea Vannath – Cambodia

She works for the Center for Social Development CSD.

A daughter of a jeweler, Vannath grew up in a secure and elegant environment. As a girl, she went to school in a chauffer-driven car. Vannath speaks three languages fluently: Khmer, English and French. After getting her diploma in public financial management, she worked as a fiscal officer in the treasury department. She married a physician, a major in the Cambodian army. They have one son.

Then came the Khmer Rouge in April 1975. Vannath’s life would never be the same again.

From « year zero », as the Khmer Rouge regime called their reign of terror, Vannath along with her parents and her husband and son were forced to leave home and made to work the fields in several provinces along with millions other Cambodians. In three years and eight months, together with many other people, she moved to different places, wherever the Khmer Rouge needed forced labor. She got up at four in the morning to pick tobacco, and saw men being taken away never to be seen again.

Vannath witnessed, for the first time, death, torture, and misery. In short, human suffering. From these experiences, she learned to understand life and suffering, life as ever changing and not permanent.

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Linked with Articles for Indigenous Peoples on our blogs.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Guadalupe Hernández Dimas, o Nana Lu, como la conocen en su comunidad, nace a la orilla del Lago de Pátzcuaro, en el estado de Michoacán. Es poeta e integrante de la Academia de la Lengua P’urhépecha. Elaboró junto con el Instituto de Antropología de la Universidad Autónoma de México la primera gramática en lengua p’urhépecha, Lanhaskapani, y fundó la organización Uarhi (mujer), donde se impulsan unidades productivas en manos de las mujeres indígenas y se realizan talleres de reflexión, encuentros, movilizaciones, publicaciones y denuncias. (inmujer).

She says: « Poverty has the face of a woman ».

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Guadalupe Hernández Dimas ‘Nana Lu’ – Mexico

She works for Uarhi (Woman).

She says also: “When I was a little girl, my grandmother told me: ‘You will be a woman soon and you must be careful in this life. You have to walk in safety and you have to know where to go and that you never have to do anything alone’. Her name was Susana. My father died when I was 22 days old, and my mother went to live with my grandparents. My mother’s name is Angela Dimas Villa. She is a very brave woman who sings indigenous songs, ‘pirekuas’. I also sing, because I was taught to. I was taught to dance and to participate in the ceremonies of our community”.

A lake and an indigenous community are her historical references. She is the only daughter of two women: her mother and grandmother. She is unique in a man’s world. Guadalupe Hernández Dimas is known as “Nana Lu”–an honorary name given to her in recognition of her work for the P’urhepecha people (indigenous people located in the State of Michoacán, in the West of Mexico, its cities are built in the brooks of the big lake Pátzcuaro, Guadalupe’s birth place).

Poem:

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « To contribute to issues that are to the benefit of the community and society at large, I think this is worthwhile even if it is at the expense of personal interests ».

After she was transferred to the Women’s Federation of Qianxi County, Yu Guixin was able to build up a much deeper understanding on women’s issues. She and her fellow workers in the Women’s Federation attend courses on related legislation, and organize legal and gender training for women in the villages. She also set up a domestic violence complaints center, and provides forensic medical services, with the overall goal of promoting the protection of women’s rights.

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Guixin Yu – China

She works for the Women’s Federation of Qianxi County, Hebei Province.

Yu Guixin is the chairperson of the Qianxi (county) Women’s Federation in Hebei Province. She was born to a peasant family in 1962. In 1982 she was admitted to the Yutian Normal School and became a teacher after graduation. In 1988 she was transferred to the Qianxi Women’s Federation. Since then, she became more concerned with and has worked relentlessly in promoting women’s rights protection. In the rural areas, people, officials in women’s federation included, often lack legal knowledge and have a low level of awareness on gender equity. Guixin took the lead and made use of her spare time to study law to become a qualified legal practitioner in 1997. Many of her fellow workers were inspired and followed suit. To make women’s rights protection more professional, organized and efficient, Guixin set up work objectives and regular appraisal systems. Guixin also worked with the public security bureau and court, and carried out the popularization of legal education at the county level.

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Amma Sakina is an Afghan human rights activist. For more than a decade, she has been working hard to raise people’s awareness of and campaigning against violations of human rights and the eradication of all forms of discrimination against women.

She says: « With peace we can perceive the real concept of life ».

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Amma Sakinah – Afghanistan

She works at grassroots as well as on organizational level to concert social work and efforts of community-based groups and NGOs. She has also worked with people with disabilities and special needs. She advocates education for all children and has run her own house as a school.

Amma’s work was triggered by her observation of the extreme injustices and discrimination against women that has prevailed in Afghanistan for decades. As an active participant in the peaceful resistance movement, she witnessed the incarceration of her own son for five years. In spite of these circumstances, she did not waiver in her commitment to achieve her goal of helping women in Afghanistan.

At present, Amma works closely with vulnerable people, such as women, children and disabled groups. She is optimistic about the future of women in Afghanistan, especially after the incorporation of an article that codifies equal rights for men and women in the Afghan constitution. In order to draw an example for women to gain self-confidence Amma has nominated herself to the presidential elections.

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « In Central African Republic during the tribal wars, women, the mothers of humanity, stood up like one person, green leaves in their hands to ask the opposing combatants to stop the bloodshed ».

She says also: “Throughout the world history and in particular in Africa, history has often demonstrated that the woman have been and remain the foundation of peace. If God, the Creator of entire Humanity did not stand to see man die, why does man please himself in the loss of his brethren? In Central African Republic, during the tribal wars, women, the mother of humanity stood up like one person, green leaves in the hands to ask the opposing combatants to cease to spill blood”.

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Sorry, I can not find any photo of Simone Clara Kossianga (see also my comment ‘Brave women without photos‘).

She works for the Union of Baptist Churches / Union Fraternelle des Eglises Baptistes Ufeb – mentionned on EBM/MASA – Europäische Baptistische Mission [European Baptist Mission] in Afrika und Lateinamerika, (see also their homepage).

Simone Clara Kossianga (49) leads a religious-based organization, the Union of Baptist Churches (Ufeb). She is a secondary school teacher and helps women to assist one another, gain additional training through religious-based seminars, and thus be peace and reconciliation facilitators in Central Africa. “Being the head of this Women network for Peace, I am sustained by conviction,” says Mrs. Clara Kossianga.

She is well placed to advocate for peace because she has lived through crisis, political disturbances and riots. The search for a long lasting peace has become a daily labor of love. “The courage of the women, their determination enables me to go on fighting to the end”, she says.

Living in a country that has known political and military turmoil, Mrs. Kossianga has had to make a lot of sacrifices to visit local provinces to work with women’s groups. With limited funding, visiting remote areas particularly those beyond 1200km of the Capital is but a labor of love – she often has to use her own resources to do that. Her salary as a school teacher and additional incomes from odd jobs are what enable her to meet the demands of her children including school fees and to supplement the organization as necessary.

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

In September 2004, Joan Hinton (Chinese name: Han Chun), an 83-year-old American who had worked in China for more than 20 years, became one of the first 28 foreigners to get a Foreigner’s Permanent Residence Permit in Beijing. She started working with the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Mechanization Sciences in 1979, after a lifetime of raising and studying cattle. She was thrilled that she could finally fully embrace her « second hometown ». (full text).

She says: « As long as there is war, science will never be free. Are we scientists going to spend our lives in slavery for madmen who want to destroy the world? »

She says also: « Are we scientists going to spend our lives in slavery for madmen who want to destroy the world? » and « can we not vision the world of tomorrow? Will it be a world of destruction and misery, agonizing death by radiation or will it be a world where mountains are moved by atomic bombs to change the course of rivers and make rich green land out of deserts? Where is our imagination? »

And she denounced the bomb (of Hiroshima and Nagasaki) as ‘a crime against humanity’.

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Joan Hinton / Han Chun – China & USA
She works for the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Mechanization Sciences.

These were the words of Joan Hinton (Han Chun), an American nuclear physicist who defected to China in the 1940s and has just been granted a green card. Rarely do I turn on CCTV 9 these days, but with my DVD player inoperative I thought I’d take a look. On the interview programme, Dialogue, appeared this frail 83-year-old widow, chuckling at her own aphorisms, so used to speaking Chinese that she struggled to find the English words, spouting her theories on the progress of communism. It does strike you as a little odd that it took 56 years for her to get a residence permit. Also odd that a scientist with experience on the Oppenheimer project was assigned to agricultural development by the new communist authorities (though she understandably said she did not wish to participate in further nuclear research) … (full text).

Joan Hinton (Chinese name Han Chun) loves science and physics, but the better things became for her in physics, the more depressed she would become. Born in 1921, Hinton was very determined to become a scientist when she was a young girl. She recalled: « even in grammar school, I can especially remember forcing the teachers to let me study Faraday’s The Candle instead of taking Latin. In high school I concentrated on chemistry, oblivious to all my other courses. Finally, in college, I settled on physics, building a Wilson cloud chamber in my sophomore year and spending as much time as I could getting in the way of the cyclotron boys at Cornell. From college I went to Wisconsin where I studied as a graduate student for two years.

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