Women at the helm of Governments

S. Pathiravitana

A government run by women. That's how the Brisbane Times, an Australian paper, announced the other day when the Governor of the State of Queensland, a woman, swore in the new Prime Minister, also a woman who headed a Cabinet of Ministers four of whom were women.

It was a historic occasion in every way and a photographer was around to cover the event. One of the female ministers wanted a picture taken of the unique all-female group along with the Governor.

As usual, as photographers often do when composing a good picture, he called out to the pack of women before him just to allay their nerves, if any, by addressing them as 'Girls.'

What followed was described by a reporter as an 'awkward' moment. Several women and men in the media gallery light heartedly tut-tutted the term used by the cameraman.

The embarrassed man then turned round to the women ministers and asked what they would like to be called. One of the female ministers replied, "You can call us sexy broads."

Whether there was a pin-drop silence or a ripple of smiles at this remark, the Brisbane Times does not say. But what was worrying me was whether Sri Lanka's record was outdone in any way by the "Sexy broads" of Queensland.

I thought I'd better look up the record books to see whether we have been outdone by this silent and somewhat mischievous happenings in Queensland. Curiously enough, it so happens that this Australian province or State is named the land of the Queen's or Queens'-land. Was there any foresight, I wonder, in naming it as such?

Aspirations of women

History beyond the 19th century does not show any aspirations of women to rule the world although it was commonly believed that the hand that rocked the cradle always does it.

Accordingly, my discovery is that, generally, people are happy to see the hand that rocks the cradle ruling the world. Japan, for instance, a male-dominant society, had seven queens spread out between 593 A.D. to 1762 A.D. Egypt has had eight Queens over a much longer period from 1500 B.C. t0 1930 A.D. including the ravishing Cleopatra who shook both Shakespeare and the Roman Empire with her reputed charm.

Britain runs close to Egypt over a shorter period (50 A.D. to 1952) but also with eight Queens including the first Queen Boadicea, now spelt as Boudica, who displayed so well women's capacity to lead and the first Elizabeth described by today's London press as being 'very sexy' and the second Elizabeth as one of the world's most glamorous women by the Vogue magazine.

Now we come to a very dismal period in our so-called modern civilisation when monarchical forms of government were either overthrown or in the alternative the monarchs and their queens confined as museum pieces for public spectacle.

Women in the West also had a very bad time. They were restricted in taking part in the rule of Government and even participating in voting. They had to chain themselves to public railings, throw themselves before running race-horses, go on hunger fasts just to show the world the discriminations made against them.

This atmosphere prevailed for sometime and then the unexpected happened. In 1964 the first woman in the world to be elected as the Prime Minister of a country took place in the then Ceylon.

This at once became the talk of the world. Little Ceylon, this little speck on the Indian Ocean, gave heart to the many in the Western world that a woman could be entrusted with the job of running a State. Israel was the first to take note by appointing a woman as Prime Minister five years later.

It didn't take long for the rest of the world to follow suit. Germany, France, Britain, Nederlands, Switzerland, Finland, Ukraine, Norway and even Iceland soon had women filling the role of Prime Minister.

Norway in particular, may be due to a karmic attraction for Sri Lanka, excelled in this direction by electing the same woman three times between 1981 and 1996. Gro Harlem Brundtlandt, the woman Prime Minister, was also at one time Director of the World Environment and Development Commission. It didn't take long for the smaller nations to imitate the bigger ones in electing women to high office.

If you take a look at a map showing Central and Southern America and the seas around them you can see how this vast stretch of land and water is strewn with Governor Generals, Prime Ministers all belonging to the female sex.

There are countries beginning their names in B's - Bermuda, Bolivia, Barbados. Followed by Chile, Argentina, Guyana, Haiti and Jamaica and a few others.

World's first PM

I nearly forgot my mission to see whether Sri Lanka's boast of fielding the world's first Prime Minister was in anyway outshone. One continent I thought that had not contributed to this band of women in high office was Africa.

I was wrong. I found that Lesotho, (a State within South Africa), and Swaziland had kings and queens as their heads of State. But the imperialists who treated the black people as savages did not acknowledge their kingships or queenships.

Instead they deceived them by coining an imposing looking term like Paramount Chief despite Swaziland objecting to the name. One such Paramount Chief was Mantseba Amelia Matsebo from Lesotho and she was in office between 1941 and 1960, a wee bit earlier than Mrs Bandaranaike. I leave the readers to decide whether Amelia Matsebo has pipped Sirimavo Bandaranaike at the post.

The one country that has not contributed anything substantial to the emancipation of women and their participation in politics is the United States of America. Though America has glamourised women, adoring them as super stars, in actual fact they seem to remain a kind of bossy mate in ordinary life like Chic Young's Blondie.

It took 144 years after the declaration of American independence in 1776 for Blondie to go and cast her vote.

Though the question of equal rights for women was raised right at the beginning by Abigail Adams, the wife of John Adams, a signatory to the declaration of American Independence, the question lay unresolved until the 20th century.

Mrs Bandaranaike's elevation to the highest office in the land must have been received in America with, first amusement and then on second thoughts with a little nervousness.

The first woman in American history to come forward to claim this title is Hillary Clinton. As everybody knows she is the wife of former President Clinton. Some say if she wins, America will get two Presidents for one.

But I am beginning to wonder whether some controversial comments she has made will get her anywhere. All terrorists, she says, cannot be put into one basket just because their tactical skills are similar; it is their ideology that gives away the real terrorists. To put it in her own words this is what she says: "....The bottom line is, you can't lump all terrorists together...I mean, what the Tigers are fighting for in Sri Lanka, or the Basque separatists in Spain, or the insurgents in al-Anbar province may only be connected by tactics.

They may not share all that much in terms of what is the philosophical or ideological underpinning. And I think one of our mistakes has been painting with such a broad brush, which has not been particularly helpful in understanding what it is we were up against when it comes to those who pursue terrorism for whichever ends they're seeking."

What a provincial view this is for a woman coming forward to head the American State, disguising as a broad outlook! For immediately it prompts you to ask who the good terrorist is then and who the rotter is? America's prospective President, Hillary Clinton, has put us into a nice quandary.

The men who rammed the twin towers in New York killing and maiming thousands of innocents, not for entertainment of course, but for ideological reasons, are they the good terrorist or how good is their ideology? On the other hand the terrorists who drove a truckful of high explosives into the many-storeyed Central Bank building killing a hundred and maiming thousands of innocents, who also acted on ideological grounds, are they the rotters?

The simple question Hillary Clinton wants us to ask is out of the two what is the better ideology? As the man at the fancy fair is supposed to have said - 'you pays your penny, and you takes your choice.' It is as simple as that.