By Zubeida Mustafa

Activism is action for change. And if change is to result in progress and not chaos, the process must have leadership. In Pakistan most changes that have been experienced in the lives of women have been driven by activists or in other cases they have evolved from socio-economic compulsions. By its very nature, activism has been a risky game because it seeks change that undermines the power of the upholders of the status quo. In the case of women, activism has called for greater courage because it has an impact on society as a whole and not just a narrow section.

Take the Women’s Action Forum. It was born in the Zia era which is widely acknowledged as being the period when the most anti-women laws in Pakistan’s history were enacted in the name of Islamisation. Where would have we been today had the 17 founder members of the Women’s Action Forum not reacted to the harsh judgment handed down under the Hudood Ordinances in 1981?

Hence the decade of the 1980s may be called Continue reading In letter and spirit →

By Zubeida Mustafa

ACCORDING to the Annual Status of Education Report 2012, only 37 per cent of three-to-five-year-old children are enrolled in pre-schools in rural Pakistan. The enrolment is slightly higher in the urban areas (55 per cent).

This is a serious problem that has profound implications for the goal of ‘education for all’.

Having neglected the education sector for decades, the state is now faced with a huge backlog of out-of-school children the majority of whom have parents with no or little schooling themselves. This, plus poverty, has aggravated the crisis in education for which innovative solutions are now needed. Continue reading Lighting the torch →