5.2. Women organizing for peace: the narratives and strategies
5.2.3. Women’s organizational roles and approaches in the post-conflict
5.2.3.4. Women and socio-economic wellbeing in post-conflict Liberia
156
or sexual abuse (FGD-C and FGD-D, July 2015). Likewise, WIPNET through its drama program raises awareness on issues around rape and inheritance law, as does DEN-L through its theatre and literacy training initiatives for local organizations and community leaders, with the goal of enhancing the voices and participation of grassroots communities in decision- making that aim to influence their lives (UI-10, FGD-A and FGD-B, July 2015). It is in this spirit of raising awareness and providing support that the Association of Female Lawyers of Liberia pushed for the involvement of the Magistrate Courts and its associates in Liberia’s post-conflict reconciliation and peacebuilding processes, and successfully advocated for the enactment of the new Law on Rape and Inheritance in 2006 (USAID 2007:18).
Important to note from the afore-discussed is the fact that the TRC process in Liberia, like any other in the context of post-conflict peacebuilding and reconstruction, are challenged by factors such as: slow implementation of policies; the continuous perpetration and subjection of women to sexual abuse and violence; the problem of stigmatization and barriers accession opportunities; as well as challenges ingrained in the justice and reconciliation mechanisms adopted for the process. While some of these challenges are expounded in chapter seven as impediments to women’s peacebuilding efforts, the study also reckons to highlight that justice and reconciliation activities often overlap with those aimed at enhancing socio-economic welfare in the post-conflict. For instance, in assessing ‘Truth Seeking and Gender’ in Liberia, Pillay (2009:98) explicated that women were more “concerned with the loss of their livelihoods and addressing daily challenges they faced, like the lack of safe drinking water;
housing; health care; and education, rather than the redress and reparations for sexual violence.” In consideration of this, women’s needs and interests can be situated in their desire for adequate healthcare, appropriate sanitation and safe water, education and shelter, and just about the necessary welfare services as a strategic human entitlement for ensuring social and economic security.
157
term security and development objectives for sustainable peace. This is necessary because strengthening state and society’s social and economic structures and capacities, especially in the aftermath of conflict is quite pivotal for the prevention of further conflict outbreaks. And as in most post-conflict agendas, the civil society, women’s organizations inclusive, are always precisely entreated to contribute and ensure the implementation of the processes, in this the case socio-economic.
Generally social and economic rehabilitation agendas in the post-conflict settings are very broad to elucidate. This is because the socio-economic reconstruction processes must take into consideration development convolutions such as inequality and marginalization in socio- economic structures and policies, economic and resource mismanagement, poverty and corruption, and institutional debility that might have been at the roots of the conflict in the first place. But as earlier reviewed in literature, Hamre and Sulivan (2002: 91) distinguish socio-economic wellbeing as including the provision of emergency humanitarian relief services and basics, such as health, education and livelihood to the population, initiating and promoting sustainable economic development projects, and institutionalizing inclusive long- term development programme. According to Ohiorhenuan (2011:3) engaging in post-conflict agendas cannot be likened only to the rebuilding of the economic and institutional engines to their former state prior to conflict outbreak. This engagement necessitates and must involve
“socio-economic transformation that combines far-reaching economic, institutional, legal, and policy reforms that permit war-torn countries to re-establish the foundations for self- sustaining development, by building back differently and better” (Ohiorhenuan 2011:3).
The Liberian example reflects a history of a protracted conflict that decimated the country, leaving it with dire socio-economic consequences. A study by Radelet (2007:4) indicate that from the first conflict emergence up till 2005, Liberia experienced “high levels of poverty with above 75 percent living below the poverty line of a dollar per day; high unemployment and underemployment levels, as refugees, ex-combatants, and displaced persons returning back to Liberia and their communities strove to find work; the farms had been abandoned, so agricultural productions plunged; and schools, hospitals, and clinics were demolished.” In this given, the African Development Bank Group (AfDB 2013:14 & 15) also highlights some of the conflict effects to include: the decimation of more than 90 percent of health facilities;
158
the enfeeblement of both primary and tertiary educational systems; and a complete age group of youth forfeiting normal education, a deficit that caused most to be physically and psychologically incapacitated and unfit for work opportunities (AfDB 2013:38). Therefore, there is no opposing that during conflict, social and economic rights are violated. However, failure to address such violations in the event of post-conflict only increases the already existing injustice for victims and impede the effective implementation of peacebuilding, reconstruction and development processes.
That the 1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, provisions for equal social and economic rights, among others, for both men and women, is to stress on its importance to human and societal development. Ensuring and guaranteeing socio-economic rights and welfare in post-conflict situations is particularly relevant for women, since they bear the brunt of conflict and are the most marginalized in society, especially in decision-making and resource allocation processes (UI-10, UI-11 and UI-12 July 2015). Understanding this importance particularly in the context of post-conflict Liberia, it is necessary to underline that since the assumption of the Presidential office by Ellen Johnson Sirleaf in 2006, the Liberian government has taken significant steps to implement policies, such as its “Poverty Reduction Strategy for 2006-2008, 2008-2011, 2012- 2018 and the Liberia Rising: Vision 2030” (Dorliae and Nichols 2012: 10). These strategies build around four pillars aimed at consolidating peace and security; reviving the economy;
reinforcing governance and the rule of law; ensuring infrastructural rehabilitation and the provision of basic services (Radelet 2007:6; Dorliae and Nichols 2012: 10). In same efforts to ensure the socio-economic welfare of Liberians, the government in 2008 adopted a National Food Security and Nutrition Strategy (FNSNS) and Food and Agriculture Policy and Strategy, to ensure consistent availability of food to all Liberians and revitalize the country’s agricultural sector (AfDB 2013: 31). These policy contexts underscore the impetus of concerted efforts to transform Liberia, which this study maintains, are not only aligned with developments vital for achieving the goals of post-conflict agendas, but also the women’s empowerment and gender incorporation as paramount for the implementation and effectiveness of the policies.
159
If the preceding sub-section discussions have established one thing, it is the fact that the participation of women in the initiation and implementation of post-conflict processes are imperative for consolidating peace and ensuring sustainability. Capitalizing on this, the study specified that all the women’s organizations in Liberia that participated in this research, are involved in different initiatives to safeguard the social and economic rights and interests of women and girls as their primary focus, and then of their communities and society at large.
For example, the Ganta Concern Women empowers and builds the economic capacity of women through their agricultural cassava production project. As articulated by the members during focus group discussions, the cassava project has greatly contributed to giving them a livelihood base to rely on (FGD-C and FGD-D, July 2015). As stated by one of the participants:
“I am today an empowered woman who can sustain my family and provide for my children, thanks to Ganta Concern Women and their different initiatives to ensure that we as women can self-sustain ourselves. Through our cassava project, I have learnt new skills on how to plant, harvest and process cassavas, something I did not know before”
The above view was also resonated by most FGD-C and FGD-D participants. In addition, UI-11 alluded that cassava is produced in small scale by members of Ganta Concern Women on community lands that have been prescribed for the cassava project, and the project benefits all its 500 plus members in all the nine communities in Nimba County. This was corroborated by UI-15 and UI-16, who further stated that cassava cultivation remained one of Ganta Concern Women focal projects, contributing to the organization as well as various household capitals and food subsistence, until the recent resource challenges that brought the project to an almost halt. In understanding the cassava project as an initiative to boost women’s economic empowerment, the study observed that cassava is a major staple crop and food in Liberia, which can be processed into different meal forms for both commercialization and consumption purposes. Moreover, the Ganta Concern Women have a rotating loan coffer that provides its members the means for resources to undertake productive, viable and profit making initiatives. In view of the rotating funds, most of the FGD-C and FGD-D (July 2015) participants acknowledged that its availability for loans, has greatly assisted them as individual members of the organization to start up a small business. These initiatives, mostly
160
in the form of petite trading, serves for profit making and provision and maintenance of their households, since most of them shoulder that social and economic responsibility.
Literature on the experiences of people, particularly of women in post-conflict situations reveals that their economic and social positioning can be bettered enormously during the processes of reconstruction and development (True 2013). Gaining such access to economic and social power however warrants a gender-equal operational space, which explains women’s organizational efforts towards their economic empowerment. Still in line with empowering women economically, it was identified that WANEP/WIPNET builds the capacity of women through some of their training initiatives, like the soap making project, which teaches women and girls how to make soap for household use and market purposes (UI-9 July 2015). The organization also operates a community radio programme where women share their entrepreneurship experiences, and how they are able to sustain their families as a result. Likewise, at the grassroots level, the organization runs a sewing project where they train young mothers and girls on how to sew and make dresses (FGD-A and FGD- B, July 2015). According to UI-13 and UI-14, the sewing project aims to empower women and girls with tailoring skills, and it had in the past offered such training to quite a number, before its current challenge of lack of maintenance resources.
In the arena of social welfare and empowerment, women’s organizations have also been engaged in different educational initiatives as vital for the transformation of the structures of social inequalities that confront youth, particularly the young girls. MARWOPNET, for instance, trains young girls through its peace education project on gender equality, how to preserve peace, and build social cohesion. It takes in especially young girls who are school drop outs to participate in the peace clubs activities, and provide them with tools on how to create and promote the culture of peace and engage non-violent strategies as alternatives to managing conflict situations (UI-8 July 2015). While this initiative of peace education is vital for young people in a society like Liberia that has suffered the ills of war, UI-10 also asserted that general education, particularly of the girl children, should be seen as a necessity and a human/development entitlement and interest. In Liberia, especially the rural areas, as in some parts of the continent, girls are often placed in disadvantaged situation as compared to boys when it comes to family decisions on educational rights and opportunities. Besides, the
161
1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, stresses the need for men and women to have equal rights to education. Accentuating this fact in the framework of Liberian experience, UI-4 maintained that ensuring the education of the girl children in Liberia is an equally important component that can boost Liberia’s realization of its reconstruction and development objectives. Taking due and progressive steps in this light, are a number of education programmes like the ‘The Girls Transformative Leadership Initiative’, founded by Leymah Gbowee in 2007 and ongoing in several communities in Liberia. The initiative sensitizes young girls and women to reflect from within and bring out the power to develop themselves and their communities by taking leading roles. Accordingly, the initiative has transformed the lives of young women in most of the communities they have worked with, in that:
“women who did not see their future pass getting married early and having children, are now going to college and university, some of them under our scholarship program…from community to community, we see girls resisting early marriages, the temptation of being prostitutes, versus now going back to school…it is happening one girl at a time. Each of these young women have realized that the power to transform their lives first, and their community lies within them, and within us women…” (Leymah Gbowee 2013).
From this excerpt, the importance and gains of education as an individual and inclusive transformative ideal for societies transitioning from conflict cannot be overemphasized. To the women and socio-economic welfare pillar, is also the focus on delivering on the basic as well as specific health needs of the post-conflict society. On the component of access to adequate health facilities and services, the general consensus from the women was that it remains a huge challenge for many, particularly women. However, their efforts in this area remain visible, especially following the outbreak of the Ebola Virus in 2014-2015 in Liberia and its neighbouring countries, Guinea and Sierra Leone. During the outbreak, LIFLEA conducted training on prevention, which aimed to sensitize and educate its security personnel on how to contain and prevent the spread of the virus at major border points where they were assigned or on duty (UI-6, July 2015). On this, the participants further remarked “security is the first point of contact and our rights to keep safe from contacting disease of any form is important…so to save others, we must then be trained to prevent the spread of the virus disease” (UI-6, July 2015). In the same spirit of service and efforts to contribute to the containment of the health pandemic,
162
WIPNET, NAWOCOL, MARWOPNET, WONGOSOL, and Ganta Concern Women, were all involved in sensitization, awareness raising and community outreach initiatives to help prevent the virus spreading further and affecting people than it already had.
Departing from the above, women’s involvement in the socio-economic agenda of Liberia constitute of measures to develop and improve responses to concerns about their social and economic rights and welfares, as well as that of their communities. Through these efforts, women are also increasing their representation and participation in post-conflict governance and challenging the unequal socio-economic structures that make them susceptible to continuous marginalization, poverty and unequal access to social and economic security and development opportunities. The challenges in the performance of their roles cannot however be omitted, as will be discussed in chapter seven. And as earlier indicated, the government is a key and major stakeholder in overseeing the socio-economic agenda in its post-conflict framework. Therefore, questions as to how the government is implementing this and enhancing women’s peacebuilding efforts in the process, is addressed in the chapter that follows.