Thursday, June 2, 2011

The heirs of Hatshepsut

Even after a revolution takes the glass ceiling to surrender to change. The Egyptian players in a revolt unfinished, do not hide the long journey that awaits. With the country mired in a roller coaster election, the payoff does not merit an extension. "It is unacceptable that the only woman in the transitional government," denounced on Thursday the Egyptian Minister of Cooperation and Planning, Fayza Aboud El Naga in an international forum organized in Cairo by the UN.

The Egyptian claim that their voice is heard in the transition. But they are aware of the route: "It is we who must fight for our rights", added the minister. A 'tsunami' of challenges has been heard at the meeting "Pathways of women in democratic transitions', become an agora of international experiences and lessons learned.

"Equality is not a luxury. It is imperative," said the director of UN Women, Michelle Bachelet. And "why not a president for Egypt?" He asked one of the organizers to remember sheet merits of Chilean politics: defense minister and president of a Latin American country for 27 years lived subjugated by the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.

Daughter of a soldier next to Salvador Allende, Bachelet revolutionary encouraged the men cried with the end of the dictatorship of Hosni Mubarak. And, to paraphrase Martin Luther King, said: "It's the right time to do the right things." "The evidence suggests that improving society if women take an active role in them," he said.

And shared a lesson learned by the women of Chile's transition: "When we separated and our forces faced (...). lose political leadership is needed to define strategies and implement an agenda of equality." In his view, it is not the speech of "one or two ministers" but "put many women in key positions" and achieve a joint government.

Only then will be on equal legal and constitutional reforms that need to Egypt. Your route is linked to the participation of women in elections on equal terms, and helped by "temporary measures such as quotas" awareness to those living in rural areas and support the emerging fabric of women's civil organizations.

"There may be groups of women with many differences but also shared priorities such as access to health or education. It is vital to build coalitions and pressure groups who propagate the message throughout the country." However, the journey through the desert also needs gestures. "When they saw me in a tank or in a military area the people thought he could do important things, preside over the republic," said Bachelet.

Mindful of the symbolism, Egyptian Minister of International Cooperation of the story dusted the biography of Queen Hatshepsut, in the Egypt of the Pharaohs won two decades of peace and development with the opposition of the priests, unwilling to govern the female hand designs of the country.

And as an epilogue Bachelet said: "The world is learning from your experience. We're looking at. You must do well." And is that the Egyptians have many glass ceilings and through an extensive list of Pharaonic challenges. Rejection from conservative and religious, the heirs of Hatshepsut add other problems.

Sexual harassment, encouraged by the machismo and embodied in the words thick and annoying friction, is a blight on traveling by bus or waiting at the door of a cafe. The Egyptians do not love women also believe that the beatings and even murder are unpunished within the four walls of home.

And the working world, which have been progressively incorporated new generations of Egyptian educated and capable, estimates his work with the old rules of patriarchy.

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