Interviews, October 17, 2000

Ana Emilia de Barousse, executive director of employment in Guinea Bissau

Cécile Ouedraogo, of Burkina Faso

“We held our national march on May 6, 2000. We gathered up demands from all around the country, in other words from the 45 provinces where women marched. We took these demands, especially those concerning poverty, to a meeting with the administration of the country,. There were clear results because we have just finished a national forum where women presented to the government our proposals for fighting against women's poverty and violence. At the international level, we really hope there will be an impact and that solidarity across the world will be stronger in terms of poor countries where poverty has a woman's, not a man's face. We hope that the United Nations and the whole world will act concretely in support of the African woman.”

S., organizer from the Rassemblement algérien des femmes démocrates (Coalition of Algerian Democratic Women), Algeria

“I am an Algerian woman. I came from Algeria especially for the World March. I am an organizer with the Rassemblement algérien des femmes démocrates and I am a journalist. I am here alone; my friends weren't able to come, but they are demonstrating in Algiers in support of the World March, against violence and poverty and so that rape of women by terrorists be considered a crime against humanity.

In terms of feminist women's associations, it's been a year now that we have been organizing activities for the World March. The events have mainly focussed on violence against women and wife battering. Actually, the main issue for women is the family code, that reduces women to an object, or legal minor. While the husband has the right to four wives, she doesn't even the right to divorce; she has no parental authority, etc.”

Georgette Ximenes., trade union organizer, Confédération Française Démocratique du Travail (CFDT), France

“For our union, being here is an act of solidarity; it is a chance to turn the spotlight on women's problems. In France, women have the problems of equal pay, hiring, and continuing education and training. Basic education for girls is now very good in France; they are now at the same level as boys, and are even obtaining higher diplomas than boys. But working conditions are still unequal in France. There is also the problem of violence in the workplace, and we are also marching for that, so that women can be workers in their own right.

What I feel here is a united will for women, so that women can leave a situation that has been our lot for thousands of years. Some countries have already made real progress; others not. We see it in Afghanistan, for example. Our strength is mainly, I repeat, our solidarity. That is how I experience the March.”

S., Afghan woman living in the United States

The March has given me the opportunity to talk about Afghan women and to tell other women about the situation of women in Afghanistan; it's really very important. It is a question of life and death for Afghan women. To attack the women, is a way of killing the Afghan nation, to kill half of the Afghan nation. We must speak up outside the country to make everyone aware, to ask you to help us because we're dying.

The women's movement, feminism, has power over the government and over the United Nations. I'm sure that if we have very clear goals and we are organized, we can accomplish some things.

In Afghanistan, we don't have the right to out alone; we don't have the right to an education, to go to school; we don't have the right to work. By negating the rights of the Afghan woman, the Taliban and their friends in Pakistan, have denied the rights of Afghanistan as an independent country; with the chador or chadri the Taliban are able to bring drugs and terrorists into the country, because women are not searched at the border.”

Lucie Amelin, Quebec Coalition of Midwives, Canada

“Oh, what an awe-inspiring experience to have marched on Saturday with over 30,000 women in Montreal and now to be here with over four million signatures for the UN; it is very moving. It was a political decision of the coalition to come here for the world event. In my opinion, it's the beginning of something that is going to continue. The bonds that have been established between women and groups, I think it is only the beginning, that the demands and the global movements will continue. We are starting to talk about a general strike initiated by women around the world; I think this kind of idea will go on. We have succeeded in getting the ball rolling.”

Madame Djallo, researcher and trainer at the École normale supérieure, Dakar, Senegal

Katia, union organizer, Confédération Mondiale du Travail (World Labour Confederation), Peru

It is really very important to be here, because we are demonstrating our solidarity beyond border, beyond cultural differences. We are here to say that all women in the world, poor and rich, have the same problems, maybe to different degrees, but we have the same problems and therefore we want to show our solidarity and represent all the women who for all kinds of reasons couldn't come to New York.

If I speak about my country, Peru, I always come back to the question of solidarity, especially since right now my country is going through a very intense time. There is a major political and economic crisis. Women are primarily concerned by the anti-social measures being enacted; women are very active and are at the forefront of the struggle against poverty and violence against women.

I think that women are extremely capable of understanding the problems and particularities of women from other countries and of totally different cultures. I believe this is a characteristic of women. I think there are many similar problems, for women in North America, China or other continents. So I don't think it is very difficult for us to understand each other, in terms of a platform of demands concerning the subjects of poverty and violence.”

Marianne, special educator, France

“What brought me here was my feminist commitment. I want to fight so that women no longer have to be subjected to sexual violence, harassment, so that they have access to work without all these forms of discrimination, so that they aren't forced to take part-time or casual work, so that they too can have decent living conditions and are properly paid for their work.

There have been several marches since January. In France, we also celebrated the 25th anniversary of the “Veil Law” that gave women the right to contraception and abortion. Recently this law was modified. There have already been some things, because there are many movements in France that want to abolish women's right to self-determination in terms of their body and sexuality and also because economic insecurity remains a big problem for women because their pay is substantially less than that of men in all occupations.

Already, we have made ourselves visible to all governments and that is very important. As an individual, I have had the chance in movements like this one to meet women, exchange addresses, discuss and transmit information about what's going on, how we've succeeded in advancing things, how others have done it elsewhere. This makes us all stronger.”

Omoro Abisa, member of the civil society, Niger

"We have been very organized for three years now. All the organizations and associations got together to organize the March. We hope that there will be a major impact. That is why we have come from Niger, we have travelled thousands of kilometers to get here; the struggle is not over, and when we get back to Niger we will continue with all the women who were unable to come here.”

Marie-Christiane, from Quebec (Canada)

“I have brought with me, on my bib, the signatures of women prisoners in Joliette Penitentiary. Women are imprisoned there for sentences of over two years to a maximum of 20 years. These women could not be here today, but they signed in solidarity with us; they made a banner, they signed a bib, they are united with women of the world. They are women who were born in Québec, and they are also women of many different cultural communities; they all wanted to be here with us today.”

Y., member of Copimar, Cameroon

“We found around 2000 good reasons to march, but it mainly comes down to the struggle against poverty, through debt reduction. The debt burden in our country huge; money that goes to servicing the debt would be enough to lower poverty significantly. One of our major recommendations, we call them recommendations and not demands; we don't want demands, that refers too much to men's rights and women's rights over men. One of our recommendations is that the entire world, in particular the funding bodies, assist countries like ours in reducing our debt burden. Fortunately for us, Cameroon is now benefitting from the initiative in favour of the most heavily indebted poor countries. In our country, 40% of our gross domestic product is allocated to servicing the debt. Imagine 40% of something like four billion dollars; that would be an enormous sum to reduce poverty; it should be used for social services, hospitals, schools, etc.

It is a great thing that women from over 150 countries in the world have united behind a common platform. This is a real gain. Because if only one country was defending that platform, people could easily say the women were just exaggerating. But when 150 countries are united behind the same goal, that means that the goal is important. That means that we know what we're talking about and it means at the same time that our demands are legitimate. It is a real problem that merits real attention on the part of the governments of all the countries in the world.”

Miconda, president and founder of the Réseau des femmes actives (Network of Working Women) of Cameroon

“The Réseau des femmes actives in Cameroon groups together 40 rural women's associations in our country. The main demand of rural women in our country is access to modern technology, because at the moment they must work with archaic methods. With access to new technology, women could produce more and get out of poverty. Also, women have no access to credit, because they don't meet the criteria for gaining access to credit. We believe that if we can resolve the question of debt cancellation, the resulting sums could be allocated for women's agricultural initiatives and women could escape poverty.

I had the opportunity to participate in the 1996 World Food Summit in Rome, where we have already brought these demands. We think that meetings like this one allow us to meet women in the world who are struggling for the same cause and to establish North-South and even South-South partnerships in order to find solutions for this category of women who are forgotten. But who is responsible for 80% of subsistence agriculture? They are the ones who feed the families; in fact they feed the society. But they are marginalized.”

Mélanie, president of the association “L'espoir renaît” (Hope is reborn), Congo

“My organization is involved in the anti-poverty struggle. We work on community development. As you know, out country has been torn apart by war and poverty has increased as a result. We are fighting to eliminate poverty and especially the feminization of poverty. Because of the war, women were subjected to much violence. This is why there are many women in the Congolese delegation, women from all sections of society.

So, we began with popular education and awareness-raising activities for women, so that women would be united to march against poverty. After that, we entered the phase of signing support cards and petitions, and then we organized the national March. It was held on September 30. We had difficulty getting here; we could have had more women, but there are still around 40 Congolese women here.

We hope that the United Nations will pay particular attention to our demands. That there will be a solution to all the women's demands. Our country has suffered from a huge debt load and we hope that the United Nations and all developed countries take the side of women so that African women can get financial support for our projects. We work in NGOs but we have difficulty getting funding and it is very hard to communicate this message. But we are using the occasion of today's March and we hope that we will be heard.”

B., from Ecuador

"We are here to call on the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank but also to demand that the UN take measures in the face of women's poverty. We set up a liaison committee in Ecuador. We organized a series of events throughout the country to gather the opinions of different sectors of women, particularly rural women, on their situation. There is just a small group of us here because we had problems getting visas. Many women from our country migrate to the United States and visa restrictions exist.

We think we have an especially large obligation now to the women of the world and of every one of our countries to continue the process started with the March.

Each country has made permanent, continuous demands on the subject of poverty, for example in our countries. However, our governments are not making decisions about the economy; those decisions are made at the Monetary Fund and the World Bank. We think it is extremely important to have gotten this far, because having all women agree is an important achievement."

B., a bank employee in Colombia and member of the Central unitaria de trabajadores (labour federation)

"I came to the World March to talk about everything that is going on in my country, the violence and poverty against women, to denounce the situation of women who are heads of households. Because of the violence in Colombia, they are left in charge of everything. They become widows, are left without a husband and therefore have to find a way to survive. In one year in Colombia, women from different social organizations worked on the March to be able to hold the March in Colombia today, in Antioquia and in Bogotá. So we collected signatures and organized ourselves. We presented 100 passports at the U.S. embassy, and they gave us not 20 but 10. We paid our own travel expenses.

For the women of our country, the World March is an opportunity to denounce to the whole world what is happening with Plan Colombia in the southern part of the country, where they are trying to eliminate drug trafficking. But, in the end, this problem exists everywhere in the world.. That is why it is illogical to destroy the fields and remove the peasants from the south, when the only way they have to make a living is by growing coca, and they are not the drug lords. The drug trade goes beyond our borders and the traffickers are powerful; they can move around from place to place, while the peasants are simply displaced because they are small farmers. In Colombia, peasants grow cassava, they take it to market, they sell it, they have to pay 20 000 pesos in bribes and cuts and they are paid 6000 pesos in the market. In other words, peasants can't make a living and have to resort to growing coca.

All over the world women are discriminated against; there is violence at home, they are discriminated against at work, they are assaulted sexually—and that is why we have come here to New York. We believe that the fact that we are here, women from all over the world gathered together, to say that the violence and poverty must stop will have an effect not only in Colombia but in the rest of the world as well.”