Farida Azizi speaking on behalf of Afghan women

After nearly a decade living outside her homeland, speaking a foreign language and raising her children in a different culture, Farida still dreams of Afghanistan. “I am there with the women - working with them, helping them.”

She pauses long enough for her slight smile to vanish. “I see them. They are very innocent. They don’t have the ways to come out, they don’t know where to go.”

She tries to explain. “My heart is still in Afghanistan, always I am thinking ... Even when I am sleeping, I am dreaming ...” Temporarily clarity eludes her, but then she states resolutely, “I cannot forget those women and their suffering.” The memories strengthen her resolve and crystallize her tireless commitment to advancing the rights of the Afghan women and children.

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The suffering of Afghan women is unparalleled in history. The Taliban forces crippled progress for women. Espousing disempowering fundamentalist principles, the Taliban excluded girls from education systems and severely limited women’s access to reproductive healthcare.

Girls were not immune. The Taliban irreparably harmed young women’s childhoods by forcing girls into marriage and prohibiting their professional advancement. With the Taliban’s express encouragement, familial violence and gender-based violence escalated in a widespread atmosphere of impunity for crimes committed against women and girls.

Five years after the Taliban’s fall, progress has been made. Schools are open. Women may lawfully seek employment. Laws protecting women’s rights do exist. Even so, women continue to face daunting odds. Escalating threats to women’s freedom and security eclipse the progress made on women’s rights. Achievements like the establishment of the Ministry for Women’s Affairs, for example, are undermined by reports of authorities virtually ignoring the targeted assassinations of accomplished Afghan women leaders, including the immeasurable loss of acclaimed women’s rights advocate Safiye Amajan, the Director of Kandahar’s Women’s Affairs department and avid proponent of educational opportunities for girls. In the last year - and in the wake of Amajan’s death - more schools closed their doors than opened them, depriving girls and young women of an integral component of their progress and security.

Farida is compelled by the daunting reality facing Afghan women. “For many years we were screaming. No one was hearing our voice,” she reflects.

That silence ended when Vital Voices invited Farida to speak at the United Nations in New York City on a panel hosted by the United Nations Development Fund for Women. Farida joined other exiled Afghan women leaders to speak publicly on the necessity to include, integrate and elevate women in governance in the reconstruction of Afghanistan. They stressed that the international community should invest in Afghan women to imbue them with the credibility and capacity to transform themselves, their communities, and ultimately their country.

Farida recalls that her experience in New York helped her to find “the voice” she lost under Taliban rule. Using her newfound voice, she felt compelled to break the silence and speak for the millions of Afghan women muzzled by the Taliban’s repressive ideology.

Farida engaged in a non-stop media blitz. She spoke incessantly, not wanting to drop a word or miss an opportunity to shine the bright light of the global media on the plight of Afghan women and girls. CNN. The Washington Post. Syndicated radio shows. Network television. Conferences. University campuses. Farida argued vocally for the women of Afghanistan who she believed to be the crucial component to building a sustainable democratic future where women, children, and men could freely exercise their basic human rights.

It was a sprint to the finish, at which time Farida may have left her microphone behind but she retained the powerful voice she projected into it. “This is the time to speak out. We have to speak out for Afghan women,” she explained.

Chosen to participate in Women’s Leadership to Rebuild Afghanistan, an intensive and high-level Vital Voices program aimed at identifying and empowering the most promising Afghan women leaders, Farida elevated Afghan women’s voices when she testified before the U.S. Senate in a briefing initiated by Vital Voices Honorary Co-Chairs Senators Clinton (D-NY) and Hutchinson (R-TX). Farida stressed the importance of prioritizing Afghan women’s presence at decision making tables, and emphasized the immeasurable value of women’s participation in public life.

Jamila, an Aghan activist exiled in Pakistan, told the Senators, including all the women serving in the Senate, “Our message is simple. The future of Afghanistan depends on the full participation of women in all areas of decision-making and life.”

The world took notice of the women’s testimonials. Moved by the Afghan women leaders’ message, the Office of the First Lady, invited Vital Voices, and Farida specifically, to introduce the President at a bill signing for the Afghan Women and Children’s Relief Act at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C. Just weeks after her Senate testimony, Farida watched proudly as the President signed legislation supporting educational and health programs for women and girls, which would advance the objectives Farida risked her life to champion. The event was a cherished moment in an otherwise dim period marked by her homeland’s ongoing struggle to overcome violent conflict and a resurgence of fundamentalism.

“We were all suppressed. We were scared. We could not come out to talk about the issues facing women. There were issues of protection for us and our family. Yet when you see other women around you, and they are ready to help you, you get strength,” she reflected. “We could not do it alone.”

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In 2002, Vital Voices invited Farida to work on one of its newest initiatives aimed at providing Afghan girls with the uniforms necessary for school enrollment after nearly one decade of exclusion from the education system. In partnership with the U.S. Department of Labor and private corporations, Farida facilitated the collection and delivery of entirely donated products for Afghan women students. Additionally, Farida engaged non-governmental partners like Women Thrive Worldwide (formerly known as the Women’s Edge Coalition) to develop a policy paper aimed at persuading lawmakers to allocate a larger proportion of foreign aid for women, especially women struggling to survive in war-torn societies.

Recounting the criticism that followed her from Afghanistan, she repeated the words of her opponents, “‘Oh, she went to America. …. She is now Westernized.’” Farida confidently counters skeptics. “It is not Westernized. It is my rights. All human beings have their rights.”

Success requires collaboration. Even in Afghanistan, women who have never been able to access protection from police will need to work with law enforcement to cooperatively address the scourge of family violence ravaging Afghan communities. Authorities need education and outreach to develop respectful and gender-sensitive operating procedures. Even HIV/AIDS, which Farida warns is “increasing day by day in Afghanistan” calls for a multi-faceted strategy that Farida believes will only develop once international institutions and non-governmental organizations focus on the needs of Afghan women and girls. She prefers Vital Voices’ responsive model. “We can use Vital Voices’ knowledge, experience and expertise.” She explains that the network of women worldwide offers immeasurable inspiration and support.

Following Farida’s work in the immediate aftermath of 9-11 and the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan, she focused on cultivating women leaders in public life. To Farida, if the voices of women are threatened, the voice of the people is vulnerable. With the passage of laws requiring women’s representation in legislative bodies, she saw an invaluable opportunity to ensure that women not only were seated at the table but that they each felt empowered to effectively engage in the process.

Despite the determination of women to embark on political campaigns for the first time in over thirty years, obstacles remained. For example, the day-to-day reality for women in public life proved increasingly dangerous. Several were killed, others kidnapped. Farida recalls, “It was very challenging for them. Still these women continued. They were very, very brave. It was difficult. ... Even now, ... they are still threatened. They receive violent warnings, their families are threatened, they are kidnapped.”

Continuing her work with Vital Voices, Farida traveled to Istanbul for a program in June 2007 to work on leadership skills for Afghan women. She recalls that sessions scheduled to end at 5:00 pm lasted until 7:00 pm at the earliest, and typically ran late into the night. “‘No, we don’t want to waste the time. We want to learn more,’” she remembers them saying. Farida remembers the conversations clearly. The women spoke about how to take advantage of the new opportunities in post-Taliban Afghanistan while also strategizing around emerging challenges like drug dealing and insecurity. Together, the women cultivated their hope, strengthened their resolve and made concrete plans for taking action upon their return home.

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Later on, Farida departs the security of America and travels to Afghanistan. She has a new dream, one rooted in her belief that women working collectively offer boundless potential. She wants to identify and convene a group of women leaders to establish a coalition to advocate collectively to advance the interests of Afghan women and girls. This journey is the first step.

In Kabul, Farida revels in the experience of recapturing glimpses of her dreams of Afghanistan. She hears the lyrical Dari language spoken all around her. The fragrances of the familiar foods only found in the local Afghan marketplace enticed her senses. The dramatic scenery of the majestic mountains circles the city.

Farida stays in Afghanistan, traveling from Kabul to Herat and then to other cities and towns. She met with women, listened to their stories. She hears commonalities among the women’s priorities – better security, greater access to justice, quality healthcare. She is formulating a plan to use the agenda articulated by the women she met to lay the foundation for the advocacy coalition of women leaders.

With the image of the advocacy coalition as a concrete next step, Farida returns to the U.S. Finding it difficult to acclimate, she reflected, “You must do something for yourself, not wait at home.” She reached out, reconnected with the network of women who reliably stood behind her, marched with her, and encouraged her at every turn to raise her voice louder.

One of those women, the lauded playwright Ruth Margraff, had just completed the script for ‘Seven,’ a documentary theater piece based on personal interviews with seven women in Vital Voices’ network all working to effect major change in the world. Ruth invited Farida to the production’s New York premiere, where the seven playwrights and their seven diverse women subjects planned to reunite to present the play’s first reading.

When Farida travels to New York for the premiere, her friends, colleagues, and even celebrities applaud her courage. Never speechless, though moved nearly to tears, Farida explains, “If I don’t do something now, it means I am creating problems for the next generation. If I start now, at least the next generation will have their peaceful life without any problems. At least someone has to come out and tell the truth.”

With the goal of establishing an advocacy group for Afghan women, Farida continues to imagine returning again to Afghanistan. For now, she lives peacefully with her children in the United States, and every day still dreams of and for Afghanistan.

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