Catégorie : 1000 women Peace Nobel 2005

Linked with The Masimanyane Women’s Support Centre.

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

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Lesley Ann Foster – South Africa

She works for the Masimanyane Women’s Support Centre.
Anu Pillay, Ashoka Representative, says about her: « I admire her for her perseverance and her capacity to keep this issue in the mainstream, in a society where too often women fall through the cracks”.

Lesley Ann Foster was born and raised in East London, in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. She attended state-operated schools which, under the apartheid structure, were under-funded and academically inferior to those attended by privileged white students. Lesley began her career as a salesperson and design consultant for a firm in Cape Town. While doing marketing in another commercial firm, she pioneered the tele-sales concept, for which she received an award of excellence in 1990. She also earned national recognition as « Most Improved Sales Person of the Year » in 1991.

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

She says: « I dream of a world where we do not have plans for equality, because equality already exists, a world where each individual has rights, just for the sake of being born. I dream of a world where one is not judged by his or her sexual orientation, race or nationality ».

She says also: “You notice this reality that envelops you and one day you get up angry, seeing that, as a woman, you do not get same access to resources, your salary is smaller and you are relegated to the traditional role of housewife. At school nobody mentions women, there are no role models for women, and those that exist are usually transformed into stepmothers, fairies or witches, or we are saved by men, the so-called ‘real’ heroes”.

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Montserrat Sampere Martín – Spain

She works for the San Fermín Project Association.

And she says: “For a woman who is mistreated or for an unemployed immigrant the best kind of help comes from someone nearby, having a coffee with them and discussing calmly, rather than meeting with them in an office in front of a computer”.

In the global village there are thousands of examples of quiet work, like that accomplished by Montserrat Sampere. In the marginal neighborhood of San Fermín, she carries out her work in an effort romote equality and change her local environment.

In the slums of Madrid, there are strikes, a lack of public services, drugs and domestic violence.

The social friction is palpable and the members of the community are often marginalized and sent off into institutional oblivion.

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Linked with The Institutum Studiorum Humanitatis ISH.

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

She says: « The death penalty is a precondition for war in any country ».

She writes: « I came to stay as Fellow-in-Residence at NIAS for five months, and was then granted another semester in January. This made it possible for me to complete more work than originally planned and presented in my application. As one of the editors on the project of rewriting comparative histories of literary cultures in Central and Eastern Europe (section Figural Nodes), I was able to commission and edit a total of 22 studies and to write my own contributions to this and to the other three sections. During the first five months, I edited a collection of articles in the Anthropology of the Ancient Worlds, translated from French. On the initiative of the Dean of ISH (Ljubljana), the initially planned introduction grew into a book on the impact of historical anthropology on Ancient studies, its problems, history and reception in the region. The book was published in April 2000 … (full text).

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Svetlana Slapsak – Slovenia

She works for the Ljubljana Graduate School of Humanities: in english, and in slovenscina.
and for the ‘Balkan Women Against War’ (not found on the net).

Born in Belgrade on 18 January 1948, Svetlana Slapsak received her MA and PhD degrees in historical linguistics and classical studies at the University of Belgrade. Her political activism began during the 1968 student movement and she was subjected to beatings, police harassment. Her passport was confiscated for eight years.

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.She says: « The children of Kosovo need to move away from the constant violence. We will do what it takes to bring peace to our communities. We are the future, and the future is in our hands ».

She says also: « I wanted peace because…I never had peace in my life. That’s why I said I wanted something, and most of the children there also wanted something, but they didn’t know what they wanted because they didn’t know what peace, tolerance, reconciliation, children’s rights were. You know, they didn’t know what that means for them ». (full text).

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Fatmire Feka – Serbia

She works for ‘Kids for Peace’. In the internet you may find: Kids for Peace.com; KidsForPeace.org; KidsPeace.org; peace for kids.org; peace corps kids world; peace4kids; PeaceKids.com; teach kids peace; kids for peace camp; … etc.

Fatmire Feka (17) is a Muslim Albanian girl from an ethnically divided town. In 1999, she lost a brother and a sister in the war in Kosovo and her family’s house was set on fire. She is a member of her town’s Council for Peace and Tolerance.

Her family was temporarily relocated to a transit shelter for internally displaced people (IDPs), managed by the non-governmental organization (NGO) World Vision International, in the city of Mitrovica, where they lived for seven months.

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Linked with Development and Improvement Society Association, with COUNCIL OF EUROPE.

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

She says: « I strongly believe that peace lives in the mind of every human being ».

She says also: “It was February 22, I struggled to save my family. I knew it was no longer secure to stay behind. A huge angry mob was marching toward our village. So I hurriedly took my mother and my younger siblings and fled to the mountain to find a safe hiding place along with our neighbors ».

And she says: “Many people are still traumatized, they still have not regained their trust in each other, they can easily be provoked by rumors, thus they have not been able to live side by side peacefully like they used to.”

Hilda Djulaida Rolobessy – Indonesia

She works for Yayasan Pengembangan dan Pemberdayaan Masyarakat YPPM.

Since the violence in Maluku erupted in 1998, Hilda Rolobessy (born 1972) has been actively involved in providing assistance to Internally Displaced Persons (DPs.

In 1999, she founded Yayasan Pengembangan dan Pemberdayaan Masyarakat YPPM, the Development and Improvement for Society Association, which provides comprehensive support for IDPs, especially women, and promotes peace and reconciliation among parties involved in conflict.

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Linked with CEDAW.

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

She says: « How do we cope with poverty? Political insanity leads to all sorts of economical diversions that affect the social environment and people’s attitudes. There is only one way out of this: democracy ».

She says also: « It is useless to speak of freedom and emancipation while education lags behind ».

Her motto, often expressed in the press, is: « Women’s Participation in Politics at the decision-making level ».

Zanaa Jurmed – Mongolia

She works for the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women CEDAW (named on UN.org).

Zanaa Jurmed, born 1950, an eminent political leader and civil society advocate, was a key activist of the pro-democracy movement and her name is synonymous with its success in the 1990s. She is a spokesperson on women’s and human rights issues in the country and abroad. Her commitment to democratic ideals and her peacemaking skills won her the first headship of the capital city organisation of the Mongolian Democratic Party.

Since 1992 Zanaa has played a leadership role in many NGOs. An extremely confident woman, Zanaa inspires confidence in others. She looks you straight in the eye when she talks to you and makes you feel that she has already sensed your truth and understood your problems.

Such features might be characteristic of charismatic leaders, but in Zanaa’s case people say this may have something to do with her being a member of the national archery team for many years!

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Linked with TRANSGÉNICOS, .

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

She says: « As long as I have the support of my people, I shall never surrender ».

She says also: « They do not respect our point of view. They ignore the Mayan people. One person was killed and 17 wounded. The government blamed us and tried to stop our protests. They wanted to scare us, but we continued. The ones who signed this treaty do not think about the people. Human beings are not a commodity. The life of a human being cannot be paid for ».

And she says: « We lived through a war that lasted 36 years. Now, with the Treaty for Free Trade (TLC) which they want to impose on us, things are turning worse. Peasants are becoming even poorer. Only a few are doing well out of this. Cultures are lost. The environment is spoiled ».

Sorry, I can not find any photo of Candelaria Hernández Gabriel, Guatemala (see also my comment ‘Brave women without photos‘).

She works for the Asociación para la Promoción y el Desarrollo de la Comunidad (Ceiba), and for the Asociación de Mujeres Mam para el Desarrollo (Asomamd).

And she asks: « Please, do me this favour and say to the people and the countries that support our people, that we need them to work together in a joint struggle. They have to put pressure on our governments so they hear what we are saying, so that they stop killing innocent people ».

A Guatemalan woman, of Maya-Mam origins, Candelaria is a displaced person (internal and external refugees, mostly indigenous, who had to flee their homes and communities due to the indiscriminate bombardments carried out by the Armed Forces), a community leader and mother of five children.

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Linked with A re-compilation of texts and blogs for indigenous peoples.

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

She says: « I believe that one day women’s leadership among our indigenous elders will be recognized. We just need to work very hard to convince our elders and to raise our women’s awareness and education ».

She says also: « I have to admit that in the past few years we have had problems and differences working with our network. Some organizations claimed our groups and our land as their work only. Our hard work was challenged because of disputes between the organizations (local NGOs) in our network. We can’t be the object of some vague discourse. We want the people to get on their own feet ».

Aleta Ba’un – Indonesia

She works for Lembaga Masyarakat Adat (named on hurights Osaka), and for the Women Voice Center Sanggar Suara Perempuan SSP (named on Population Council, and on Open Society Institute, Budapest).

Aleta Ba’un (born 1966) is a West Timorese community organizer who defends the rights of indigenous peoples. She has helped found many local NGOs, including the Women Voice Center Sanggar Suara Perempuan (SSP) and the Eastern Indonesia Women’s Health Network (JKPIT). Her leadership has been an inspiration to other activists, especially to other indigenous women.

« Indigenous people are always left behind. We have to struggle to maintain our way of life », says Aleta Ba’un, referring to her identity as a West Timorese indigenous woman. Her kind gestures and motherly approach leave an imprint on anyone who meets her. Her modesty is typical of the culture of the Timorese people.

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

She says: « We all share one common home. To burn down just one part of it is impossible: we will burn it all ».

On graduating from Leningrad University, Irina Dementieva worked as a journalist with Russian publications. After the suppression of democracy in the Czech Republic (1968), the staff of the ‘Zhurnalist’ magazine, where she worked as an editor, was dismissed for their pro-democracy stance. Throughout her career as journalist, Irina has unceasingly promoted the ideals of a free press and free access of society to unbiased information. One of the focal points of her activism is humanitarian aid in Chechnya, where she has worked trying to bring home the truth about the war to the Russian people.

Irina Dementieva – Russian Federation

Irina Dementieva graduated from Leningrad University the year that Stalin died (1953). This was a time when the country expected great change and hoped for an end to totalitarian rule. Irina began her journalistic career in the local newspaper of the city of Tomsk (regional center in Siberia).

Later, she got a position with the Moscow newspaper ‘Sovietskaya Rossiya’ (‘Soviet Russia’), and afterwards worked as an editor in the Moscow magazine ‘Zhurnalist’ (‘The Journalist’).

After the suppression of democracy in the Czech Republic by the Soviet troops in 1968, the magazine staff took a firm pro-democracy stand, which resulted in mass dismissals in the team (including Irina).

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Linked with Freedom House.

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

She says: « To improve the world we live in, citizens need to be empowered through education and free access to information ».

Cristina Guseth is the director of Freedom House, Romania. In 2004, Freedom House joined the Coalition for a Clean Parliament to inform Romanian citizens and improve accountability of their representatives in Parliament.

Cristina Guseth – Romania

She works for Freedom House.

Cristina Guseth has been working for human rights and the empowerment of civil society in Romania since 1991. From 1991 to 1997, she worked with the Soros Foundation in Romania in its pioneering work to develop a free press in the country. She helped establish the BBC Radio and TV Journalism School, the only vocational broadcast school in Romania.

Cristina Guseth’s family experienced the lack of personal freedom and civic liberties under the communist regime in Romania. Since the 1989 political change, she has taken the opportunity to work in the human rights’ field, promoting and sustaining democratic values. She has been working to empower Romanian citizens, to raise their awareness about their civic and political rights and to encourage them to stand up for those rights.

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