education rights of the girls

With the Name of Kind God!

I convey my greeting to you dear audience, the today’s discussion which is going to be present to you through the Change in Life Compiegne is about the educational rights of the girls and the guests that we have with us are Ms. Homaira Ferozi, Head of the education department of Women for Afghan Women organization, Ms. Mariam Zurmati, deputy in charge of the support and development of women’s right in the independence human rights commission in Afghanistan, Ms. Mariam Sharifi the advocate in the Medica Afghanistan organization and Ms. Robaba Parwani on of the members of the parliament.

Question: At the beginning I would like to ask from Ms. Zurmati that based on your opinion how is the current situation and conditions of women education?

Answer: If we look at the overall conditions of the women education then I will say it is not satisfactory, because insecurity, incursion of cultures, lack of technical cadres, early marriages are the reasons that could affect the conditions of the education among the girls and women.

Question: In the current situations as many girls and boys could not qualify to the higher education and the ministry of higher education has promised that they will be admitted in institutes, Is these facilities available in the capital and as well as in the provinces?

Answer: In the current situation the insecurity is one of the biggest obstacle on the way of women education, in the capital city to some extent these facilities are available but in the remote areas of the country these facilities are not available. From other side the admission or attraction of students in the educational institutes were satisfactory but it is to say that based on the opportunities available in the past 10 years for the people of Afghanistan through international community, no sufficient work has done.

Question: Ms. Zurmati; you have also mentioned about the cultural problems on the way of women education, please tell us that which cultural problems are the obstacle on the way of women education?

Answer: The cultural problems that I mentioned is about the lack of awareness among the families regarding the rights of their women and girls, there are many families available that because of unfair customs and traditions, are not welling that their girls go to education, they think that only by sending their boys to schools the problem would be solved, whereas the availability of one educated women in the family could cause that all the members of that family become educated.

Question: Ms. Parwani; is there any punishment for those who are not letting the women to go to education in the criminal law of Afghanistan or not?

Answer: First of all I would like to say that the issues mentioned by Ms. Zurmati are in fact serious, we are always trying to find solutions for these problems from different authorities; among which is the law of prohibition of violence against the women which was circulated as a command from the president side, where we tried to bring some changes in this so that the problems of the women and girls are solved to some extent.

But the point to mention is that in the past we had good laws and currently also but the important point is the implementation of these laws which are unfortunately not done properly.

Question: Based on your discussion it seems that in laws there is no punishment for those who are the obstacle on the way of women and girls towards the education, but now as we are living in an Islamic society and there it is mentioned that getting education is compulsory for both men and women; now those who are the obstacle about the compulsory saying of Islam, what are their punishments?

Answer: Well; without doubt that abandonment of compulsory things in Islam is not allowed, but in Islam there is not the issue of force; if someone is not welling to get education then he/she should not be forced to get but if there are people who are forcing the women and girls not to get education, they are the biggest cruel personalities.

Question: Well; why the criminal laws of Afghanistan has not predicated punishment for the doers of these actions?

Answer: Well; if we would be able to implement the current laws, these laws can solve most of the problems but if we would request more serious punishment for the doers then probably these laws were rejected rather than endorsement, finally I would like to say that in the current situations if these laws are implemented then most of the problems would be solved.

Question: Ms. Sharifi; what are your opinion regarding the punishment of those who become the obstacle on the way of women education?

Answer: The article 43 of the constitute of the country has predicated the education for all; from the other side in article 35 of the prohibition law of violence against women it is mentioned that if someone becomes the obstacle on the way of education and other facilities of women and girls then he will be punished for at least six month imprison, therefore we can say that punishments are considered for the doers.

Question: If we have the laws and the lawyers continuously creating new laws but there is no implementation then what would be benefit of these laws?

Answer: Yes, whenever on a specific issue a law is created then on all of its implementation angles should be focused but in all governments there are three type of authorities, legislature, Judicial and executive; in our country the legislature or law maker could have come to some extent to develop the laws but after that is the responsibility of the executive body, where without doubt we know that we have problems in our executive authorities. People are complaining because of the lack of implementations of the laws in different organizations of the country, based on my opinion until a coordination is not created among these institutions having the laws won’t be effective.

Question: How are you evaluating the coordination of three forces of the country?

Answer: In the current situation whatever we are observing is not at all considerable as coordination and unless and until this coordination is not created reaching the real targets won’t be possible.

Question: Ms. Ferozi; based on your opinion what would be the responsibilities of the government until they reach to the right of getting education?

Answer: Well; based on the different laws like constitute, law of prohibition of violence the government has the responsibility to provide the education facilities to women.

First of all the government authorities should find that that what are the obstacle on the way of getting education among the women; where without doubt we can say that the first effective thing would be unfair customs and traditions of our society and in order to diminish it there is a need of awareness which would be a better and more effective way. Whenever we would be able to aware all the members of the society about their rights and everyone understands about his/her right and the rights of others then for sure that this problem would be solved and here the government has the real responsibility.

Question: Is this responsibility only reverts to the government or civil society institutions and other organizations working for women have also responsibility in this regard?

Answer: If we focus to the activities of civil society organization; the government with this vast facilities has not; for example, the civil society institutions are working in faraway areas where the government has not access yet but the civil society organization are differently working there.

Question: Ms. Zurmati; could the government provide the things mentioned in the law to the women?

Answer: In the law it is mentioned that all the civilians of Afghanistan should have access to the education, but the important points are the lack of security, increased poverty among the people of the society could be considered as the reasons creating obstacle for the educations of the girls. Therefore we can say that in a society where there is no security and poverty is there then how the law would be implemented.

From the other side in some of the situations and mostly in the villages of the country as the girls are forced to marriages before they complete their education which is basically a financial source for some of the families.

Question: From a while the ministry of education of the country is struggling to admit the females in the curriculum of education, based on your opinion are these struggles fruitful or not?

Answer: Well; this is one of the responsibilities of the government to provide the facilities of the education for the overall people including males and females but the current government which is yelling of democracy and women’s right could not provide the conditions of education for this layer of society.

Question: Ms. Sharifi; based on the laws, is there any difference for provision of education for males and females or not?

Answer: Education is the right of each and every person of this society and for this purpose the article 43 of the national constitute is explaining with clarity that education and higher education is the right of each civilian of Afghanistan and until the bachelor degree it is free. In the law it is mentioned civilians without any difference for men and women.

Question: Ms. Parwani; sometimes back a document is issued from the scholars council of Afghanistan, is there anything mentioned about the education of women?

Answer: Yes, in one of the articles of this document it was mentioned that based on the Islamic laws without any legal excuse the women are not allowed to go out of the homes, so we can simply say that if the women are not going out of the homes, how can they go for education where this topic may have relation with the education of the women. In another part of this document it is mentioned that the women cannot talk with men; it is also not possible in the education process to be without men which simply create a problem.

Question: But in this document over some important points about the women are also discussed, what is your opinion in this regard?

Answer: Without any doubt that there are some good points about patrimony but what seems important is about the education of the women which is prohibited to some extent which is extremely a point of worry; but one issue not to forget that in the article 3rd of the national constitute of the country it is mentioned that no law against the Islamic law can be developed and whenever we see the details of the scholars provided is somehow worrying.

Question: Well; what was the reaction of the women’s affairs commission in the Parliament?

Answer: well as we meet most of the members of scholar’s council, this document was developed by some of the members of the council, the opinion of all the scholars are not included in this document and therefore based on our views it is also not implementable. Also in response to this issue, the director of women’s affairs council of the parliament also had clashes with other members and finally this document was rejected.

Question: As our current discussion are about the rights of education for the women; Is there anything mentioned in this document or not?

Answer: In this document it is mentioned that education and higher education is the right for all and in one article it is mentioned that the women and girls are not allowed to study under one roof with men.

Question: Is this step a good action to control the immoralities because we are the witness of some cases even in Kabul University?

Answer: Without doubt that this is a good proposal but this step cannot be taken in all aspects and areas.

But it is to say that we believe that this document is more problem creator.

Question: Ms. Zurmati; one of the point which is mentioned in the scholar’s document is not talking of boys and girls during the process of education, what are the good points and drawbacks of these sayings?

Answer: I would like to share one of my personal opinion and experiment conducted in one of the provinces of England. In one of the provinces of England the schools of boys and girls were separated and it was found as a result that the education level of the students was extremely increased as compare to the co-education system. Therefore, we can say that if the schools of boys and girls are separated then it will have its positive effects on their education levels and development because in the age these children are they are sexual intentions make them busy in spite of keeping them focused to their studies where it may bring negative effects of the education of the girls.

Question: One of the requirements of the holy Islam is to getting education at the same level for all; based on your views how much practically this commandment has taken place in our country?

Answer: Whatever is important is seeking of knowledge both for men and women, but it should be monitored that this action won’t become an immorality among them and the other point is that in our country not everyone has negative minded for the education of the girls but as the insecurity is in our country sometimes it is hard to provide the conditions for education.

Question: Ms. Sharifi; what steps should be taken until the women be aware of the Islamic commandment and their rights?

Answer: First of all we need to remember that in Afghanistan most of people are concerned with insecurity, our country is having a classic customs and traditions and to my understanding if we can bring security and remove these unfair customs and traditions then it would be a great achievement and by having effective programs for the education of women and girls then we can ensure that they are aware of their rights.

Thank you all for following the discussions until end with us.