Feminists to be remembered

Tuesday, March 07, 2006
INTERNATIONAL Women's Day is a time to remember feminists or women's rights defenders who pioneered work on women's rights and look at lessons learned since then.
This year International Women's Day would be celebrated on Wednesday March 8 with the theme 'women and men are created equal'.
The coordinator of the Fiji Women's Crisis Centre Shamima Ali said it was the day women celebrated their hard fought gains and took stock of the struggle ahead of them.
Ms Ali said often themes for such days were just high-flying words, which meant nothing and in fact diluted the real significance of the day.
'International Women's Day is about women's activism for women's human rights and for the FWCC this is always the theme,' she said.
She said International Women's Day had its beginnings in the women's struggle for better working conditions.
'That was in 1857 and the cry was for bread and roses-while we want food (bread), we also want a life of dignity and good things (roses).
'Locally what has changed? Our factory workers in Fiji are still crying out for everything women from the west cried for two centuries ago.
'So our struggle is far from over. Women activists have to continue the activism and International Women's Day should be a day when we once again unite and commit ourselves to a better world for women,' said Ms Ali.
She said the Centre did not believe that speeches and a once a year event would achieve the objective.
'For the FWCC, we will continue our STOP RAPE campaign by distributing community awareness materials and holding the traditional Reclaim the Night march,' Ms Ali said.
Meanwhile, the International Labour Organisation would celebrate the day with a range of guest spea"