Striving for equal opportunity for women

Last week it was reported that Sri Lanka obtained the 15th place in a Global `Gender Ranking’, faring better than most Asian and some European countries in terms of granting equal opportunities for women.

It is also reported that Sri Lanka is ranked ahead of United States (31), Switzerland (40), France (51), Thailand (52) and Italy (94). Sweden has scored 81.46 and ranked in the top while Yeman was placed right at the bottom. This was revealed by a survey conducted by World Economic Forum.

We have a few things to discuss with regard to this latest record set by Sri Lanka at the International arena. When it comes to some countries such as Sri Lanka, many (especially foreign organisations) always talk about negative things.

They often see how human rights are being violated here and how badly people are being treated. They place us in different ranks and talk about such things on every possible occasion.

They can never see anything positive happening in Sri Lanka. Almost all foreign organisations only see war widows, women affected by war and ill-treated women and children.

When considering this latest achievement of Sri Lanka at international level, it seems certain foreign organisations and authorities purposely destroy Sri Lanka’s image while dancing according to personal secret agendas under the influence of certain forces. Otherwise how can Sri Lanka achieve such a higher position in the International level defeating even the United States?

How about talking something positive about Sri Lanka for a change? The most difficult thing for foreign authorities is to find out words to talk about the latest record set by Sri Lanka.

Now we can ask them how we, Sri Lanka grabbed such a higher position defeating U.S. and other rich and developed countries if we have that many war widows and women affected by war according to certain non-Governmental organisations.

There were many `stories’ about Sri Lankan women who were very badly affected by war and conflicts. But if such records exist, Sri Lanka would not be able to set this international record because gender based discrimination is mostly found among affected communities.

We have to mention another important fact. That is it was Sri Lankan women and children who were mostly affected by the tsunami disaster. But still Sri Lankan women do better than U.S. women.

It is no wonder that the same organisations which always try to destroy the good image of Sri Lanka try to grab the credit for minimising the gender gap? According to them they are the ones who do everything for women and children.

No Government does anything. But actually what they do is to tarnish the image of Sri Lanka while earning large amounts of money. This achievement for Sri Lanka will be a real shock for such organisations.

We cannot be satisfied with this achievement by Sri Lankan women. It is not something granted to them by some others. We have to acquire more goals in the field of gender equality.

If we stop here we will not be able to gain what we have to gain such as total eradication of violence against women and domestic violence which affects many Sri Lankan women. Sri Lankan women have more things to acquire in many fields.

There are certain things that need to be improved for sure. One fine example is women’s representation in Parliament and in politics. In some other countries women’s representation in the Parliament is 30 per cent but in Sri Lanka it is only 4.9 per cent.

In countries such as Uganda, women hold high positions in important ministries such as defence and finance but here in Sri Lanka women politicians never get an opportunity to hold an important ministerial post. They always received portfolios that were treated as `unimportant’.

Sri Lankan women should also get rid of some other invisible hazards such as cultural and religious hurdles. Here in Sri Lanka still widows are being treated meanly in some communities and they are not welcomed for happy occasions and certain ceremonies.

Married women without children are considered ‘unpleasant’ on some occasions. Women are treated as ‘dirt’ in some cultures in some occasions because of their biological structure. On certain other occasions there is an invisible unhealthy pressure on girl children and women.