WUNRN

http://www.wunrn.com

 

Jalal Foundation - http://jalal-foundation.org/

 

 

Status of Widows in Afghanistan:

Issues, Challenges and Options[1][1]

 

By:

DR. MASSOUDA JALAL

Founding Chairperson, Jalal Foundation and

Former Minister of Women, the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

 

 

1.         Overview[2][2]

 

Afghanistan is one of the world’s most prolific producers of orphans and widows. The number of widows in Afghanistan is estimated to be from 600,000 to two million (2M), one of the highest in the world when analyzed against the overall number of Afghan females falling within the reproductive age bracket of 15 to 49 years old.  Some 30 to 50 thousand of them are said to be residing in the capital city of Kabul and the rest are scattered elsewhere in the country.  On the average, they were widowed at a very young age of 20 to 30 years old -- mainly as a consequence of early marriage, betrothal to exceedingly old men, deaths of men in armed conflict, and the generally low life expectancy of Afghans (45 years old).

 

A typical Afghan widow is around 35 years old. Around 94 percent of them are illiterate and an estimated 90 percent have 3 to 8 children/off springs.  The average period within which a woman remains a widow in Afghanistan is 10 years. Given the lack of employable skills, dire economic options, poor social support, stigmatization, and the extremely low status of women in society, Afghan widows and their families wallow in extreme deprivation and are among the most vulnerable citizens of the country. Studies reveal that they are at least five times more prone to oppression, malnutrition and violence. 

 

 

II. Issues and challenges

 

Widowhood in Afghanistan is like a death sentence, or worse.  A 2006 report of UNIFEM indicates that 65 percent of the widows living in Kabul had attempted to commit suicide at least once. Their dismal situation is an outcome of interlinked socio-cultural, economic, political, and human development factors that evolved through  long period of political rifts and armed conflict, giving birth to a life that is perhaps the worst possible the world could imagine for widows, to wit:

 

·         Negative socio-cultural factorsAfghanistan is a highly patriarchal society whose norms, beliefs, practices and traditions are shaped by extremist values of fundamentalists which regard women as less than a human being.  Afghan women are generally viewed as ‘un-equals’ whose existence is circumscribed by their relationships with men and have no social identity of their own. Before marriage, they are daughters to their fathers; and once married, they assume the identity of a wife to their husband. When a husband dies, the wife’s life suffers a major de-stabilizing shock as it marks the sudden loss of her social identity, source of protection and support, and basis for functioning in society. Widowhood in Afghanistan is like a ‘death sentence’ because it instantly changes society’s perception and attitude towards a widow as a harbinger of disgrace and bad luck, a liability, a drain to family resources, and no more than an economic object whose energies could be exploited in slave-like manner[3][3].  Afghan widows are either taken back by their original family or the relatives of their husband. Otherwise, they wallow in wretchedness as street beggars. For many widows, death is a sweeter option.

 

Among the major factors that contribute to the disadvantage of Afghan widows, negative socio-cultural factors are the most pernicious, most recalcitrant, and most difficult to address.  As long as society is dominated by men with values that are antithetical to democracy, human rights and gender equality, Afghan widows’ empowerment would remain arduous and elusive.

 

·         Economic factors - Afghanistan is one of the least developed countries of the world with a 35.8% national poverty rate and a Poverty Gap Index of 7.9. One third of urban residents require continuous food assistance and the figure is much higher for rural areas where 80 percent of the population lives[4][4]. Serious economic deprivation exacerbates the social disadvantage of widows.  Under the custody of her ex-husband’s family, a widow is most likely abused as overworked, unpaid, and under-fed economic laborers and household slaves[5][5]. Often, they are sexually violated and subjected to physical violence. In the household competition for very scarce economic resources, and given the overall lack of economic opportunities in the country, many widows are left with marginal or no resources at all to subsist in humanely possible way. Combined with negative socio-cultural factors that look at widows as passive victims, general dearth of economic options makes advocacy for widows’ empowerment tenuous and unattractive.

 

Apart from these, it is not unusual for Afghan widows to lose their inheritance entitlements to male in-laws. Denial of property rights - mostly as a result of their limited contributions and control over household income - easily pushes widows and their children to the brink of penury. Without properties, education, skills, and connections, and given society’s tight restrictions to Afghan women’s mobility in public, it is not unusual for widows to stride into absolute poverty than into economic productivity. 

 

·          Political factors – The pursuit of women’s empowerment and gender equality in Afghanistan sits in a political time bomb.  As the 2014 deadline for the withdrawal of international security support draws to a close, Taliban fighters have started to return to the mainstream of national life and Taliban leaders begin to receive political concessions from government.  Against this backdrop, Taliban-style cruelty and criminalities to women have re-surfaced, resulting in increased resurgence of female-directed extra-judicial executions, assassinations of activists, murders, beheadings, and honor killings.  Given this context, the plight of Afghan widows will continue to take a back seat. The attention of government to women’s empowerment has dramatically declined and this is not about to change in the next five years. 

 

Except for Article 53 of the Constitution, which articulates a guarantee that the rights and privileges as well as assistance to women without caretakers and needy orphans will be ensured, Afghanistan does not have a clear policy on widows.  The National Action Plan for the Women of Afghanistan (NAPWA) recognizes the disadvantage faced by widows and the Afghanistan National Development Strategy explicitly acknowledges that widows are among the most vulnerable people of the country.  Yet, all these policy instruments remain un-elaborated and un-implemented. Many of the interventions for widows are done by non-government organizations and international agencies. Due to the enormity of constraints faced by programming in the country, many of the interventions for widows were palliative, un-sustained, and detached from overall priorities of government. 

 

·        Human development factors – Years of war and the Taliban’s policy of prohibiting female education left behind a female population that is overwhelmingly illiterate, contributing to the stunting of their potentials to live a full and satisfying life. Thus, Afghan widows are without economic skills, politically disempowered, physically unhealthy, and excluded from the mainstream of social and political lives.  Worse, more of them live with emotional trauma due to the terrors of war and the loss of husbands, relatives, properties and social connections. 

 

Under the Ministry of Labor, Social Affairs, Martyrs and Disabled, widows and their families receive welfare support.  However, such interventions do not represent an empowering and enduring response to the situation. There are evidences, however, that appropriate interventions enable Afghan widows to rise above their dismal situation. A number of international organizations and NGOs implemented projects whose results proved that an integrated approach to widow empowerment, such as skills development, building of support groups, livelihood opportunities, counseling, and welfare support restore their social functioning and enable them to get out of their sordid predicament. 

 

III. OPTIONS

 

We agree that the initiative to call for a separate UN resolution on the empowerment of widows all over the world stands as the most ideal broad step at the moment.  Afghan women will benefit a lot from the surge of international pressure that such resolution would elicit.  We have seen from the experience on the CEDAW, Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and many other international instruments that there is tremendous power in international solidarity. We therefore support this conference and all other conferences leading to such UN resolution and we are ready to do our part in advancing this agenda in every way possible.

 

Toward this end, we will mobilize our networks, lobby with our government and our international NGOs and diplomatic corps in our country, educate the public about the plight of widows, prepare case studies and gather statistics, and work with media to bring widows’ concerns into the realm of public policy.  Solidarity and consolidated power will stand as our best defense against the indifference of policy and decision makers. In Afghanistan, there are splintered groups of widows that we could be brought together and empowered to pursue varied forms of advocacy.  They need to be engaged, positioned in the frontline, and given skills to speak for themselves and move institutions and officials to action. They need to be recognized as main stakeholders of the peace process and must have a voice on the terms of the peace negotiations. We also need to engage organizations that are dedicated to the empowerment of widows because they have the experiences, resources and knowledge that could bolster our activism.

 

The widows’ network should be aided in adopting a common platform and framework that could be pursued at the international, regional and country levels beginning with very strategic and foundational measures such as institutionalization of national mechanism dedicated to widows’ empowerment, conduct of studies on the situation of widows, adoption of a national law on widows, and allocation of specific funds/budgets for programs and projects promoting widows’ empowerment. Since the plight of widows is differentiated by contexts, we need to be able to harness the resources and support of the more advantaged widows to help uplift the situation of those who are not, in the spirit of global solidarity and sisterhood.

 

Unfortunately, Afghanistan will have to pursue the advocacy for widows’ empowerment in a highly volatile and challenged political context.  This is not to say, nevertheless, that we cannot do anything.  Back home, there are options that we will try to pursue to strengthen the global campaign for widows’ empowerment, such as:

 

·     Establishing baseline information on widows – It is important to have a more accurate picture of widowhood in our country because these will inform advocacy, policy making and programming.  We will therefore try to put together all existing statistics and studies on Afghan widows, their needs and issues, the strengths and weaknesses of policy and program measures, available mainstream resources that could be channeled to widows and factors that stand in the way of uplifting their situation, as well as researches and case studies about their lives. Based on this, we will develop and disseminate information materials that could be used by media and other partners in our advocacy and we will input our baseline information to any regional, sub-regional or global database that will be established in this regard;

 

·     Multiplying champions and raising accountability for widows’ empowerment – We find it important to increase the number of influential people who could champion the rights of widows in the realms of law, policy, and action. We need to go beyond ourselves and get other people to own the issues of Afghan widows and recognize that they have a role in transforming their lives. If the government recognizes its responsibilities to the casualties of war, it is equally responsible in rebuilding the lives that were destroyed because of war. We will therefore facilitate dialogues among legislators, policy makers and widows to generate organic information that could support policy and action and to motivate as many ‘influentials’ as possible to advance widows’ empowerment. Along this line, we will facilitate the drafting of a law on widows and use it as centerpiece agenda for such dialogues.  We will also bring together institutions and organizations mandated to improve the lives of widow to reflect on the effectiveness of their interventions and work together for greater impacts and synergy.

 

·     Lobbying for greater resources for widows - Even if the government is engaged in a peace process, the reality is that attacks and killings by Talibans continue. This means more threats of widowhood for wives, and greater number of children running the risk of becoming orphans. We believe that the time to allocate funds for veterans, widows and orphans is not after the war but before the war.  The budget for the peace process of my country needs to be re-examined to ensure adequate and timely release of financial and other resources for widows and orphans. If the government is giving huge sums of money to returning Talibans who were responsible for the destruction of many lives, it should give equally huge amount of money to those whose lives were ruined by war. This is a platform that we will advocate with high level candidates in the coming elections and an argument that we will use to motivate more women to run for public office.

 

IV. CONCLUSION

 

Afghanistan is one of the very few countries in the world where the life expectancy of women is lower than that of men. Therefore, if only war could be stopped and peace would be given a chance to reign in our lives, Afghanistan will no longer be a major contributor to the growing statistics of the world’s widows.  May this Conference find fruits in the collective wisdom, commitments, and peace efforts of all of us.  Let the candles that will illuminate the widows’ journey towards empowerment be born in this conference.  Bottom of Form








[1][1] Paper presented by Dr. Massouda Jalal to the ‘International Conference on Enriching the Journey towards Empowerment of Widows held o 4-6 February 2013 in Kathmandu Nepal under the auspices of Women for Human Rights, Single Women Group (WHR) and South Asian Network for Widows’ Empowerment in Development (SANWED) and SANDEF. Dr, Jalal is a human rights activist from Afghanistan, founder and Chairperson of Jalal Foundation, former Minister of Women, and the first female Presidential candidate of the country.

 

[2][2] United Nations Development Fund for Women (2006); International Organization for Migration (2006); Institute of War and Peace Reporting (2003); United Nations (2006);  and Basir Bita (2010).

[3][3] Yahweh, 2010.

[4][4] National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment (NRVA), 2007/08.