WUNRN
An interview with Hanaa Edwar, General Secretary of Iraqi Al Amal Association and Head of the Iraqi Women Network.
- From
full literacy declared in the seventies,
Q: What kind of work does your
organisation do to protect women rights?
A: Through Al Amal we have been
administrating the Iraqi Women Network, an office that promotes outreach
amongst local women organisations by enhancing relations with many
international organisations as well as involving women in different activities
and training courses. One of our biggest achievements has been the Parliament
quota thanks to which 25 percent of the MPs are female. Now we’re working on a
new campaign in the frame of the Arab Spring to protect personal freedoms.
Q: What are the most
pressing problems for Iraqi women today?
A: We represent more than 55
percent of the Iraqi population but we are buried in a society which has been
exclusively drawn on male patterns. We cannot see any women leading political
blocks or occupying high positions in the government. However, I would say that
marginalisation of the local women is due to cultural reasons more than
political.
A painful issue is that of the
million and a half widows in the country left by the war. Before 2003,
Q: Wasn’t
A: In 1959
Speaking about children, girls
are often forced to marry at the early age of 10 or 12 and, today, we even have
the ‘temporary marriage’, something which has obviously been imported from
Q: Is the women quota in
Parliament working as expected?
A: There is a representative
share of 25 percent thanks to which there are 84 women in the Iraqi parliament.
However, most of them got their seats due to their personal affinity with the
leaders of the political parties, and not because of merit. It’s doubtless true
that, despite the difficulties, there is still a large number of women able to
hold these positions with responsibility, but most are relegated to the
background.
Q: There’s also a
Ministry for Women in the current Iraqi executive. Isn’t it effective either?
A: It’s called the ‘State
Ministry for Women’ and there’s a draft law to change it to ‘State Ministry for
Women and Family’. This speaks volumes about the role Iraqi women are supposed
to play in our society. Anyhow, we are against any sort of ministry for women
because we think that women issues shouldn’t be linked with one particular
ministry but with society as a whole. Besides, it has very little budget. A
Ministry for Women will always be linked to a political party, so what we need
is a more independent commission that monitors government policies and empowers
programmes to improve women’s lives.
Q: Senior NGOs have
recently pointed to a dramatic increase in the number of suicides among Iraqi
women. Even cases of female genital mutilation have been reported.
A: The alleged ‘suicides’ often
help to hide murders, and help family members to wash the ‘honour’ of the
family. And they are committed amid the biggest impunity because they are seen
as ‘domestic issues’ by the judicial system. The FGM cases occur in some remote
areas of
Q: How is sectarian
division affecting Iraqi women and the society as a whole?
A: This is a fabricated
sectarian hatred which started in 2006 and which has been imposed and boosted
from the highest levels to divide and rule through violence and fear. The lack
of dialogue between the leading political parties, and the ever growing role of
religion is choking our society. Many families won’t let their daughters marry
somebody from another sect, and that’s something new in our society.
Q: Next spring will mark
the tenth anniversary of the invasion of the country. Can we talk about any
social improvement since 2003?
A: It is true that after the invasion we wiped off our isolation in the international arena as well as the taboo over free thinking. Before 2003 you simply could not talk of political pluralism, active civil organisations or any kind of contact with the outside world. But after the invasion and destruction of the country, our borders opened to terrorist groups that added to the local militias, both Shia and Sunni. We are mired in a mess where instability and the lack of security are the only constants. Today we are facing a tremendous political crisis; we have moved from a three-decades long dictatorship to a state which has no effective government.