Monthly Update: August, 2007
Women's Rights: ActionAid Area office in collaboration with Noor Education Trust a local organization working on the issue of human trafficking, organized a one day symposium on Trafficking of Women.
Increased incidences of violence and cross border trafficking of young minor girls have been reported between Pak- Afghan borders. A steady increase of such cases have been referred to government and non-government shelters by the local police, courts and organizations such as UNCHR and IOM. Girls are trafficked from both sides and they mostly face a lot of sexual exploitation.
Similarly trends of internal trafficking have also been identified through a pilot research by a local organization. The project identified over 100 cases of women (mostly minor at the time of transaction) trafficked to parts of Sindh and Punjab. These are only those that have escaped and returned to their families. A majority had to buy back their freedom from the local gangs involved in the business while there are those who are still entrapped and harassed by the gangs without much relief from the police or courts.
The gangs involved in the business have links with external traffickers also supplying girls to internal market for labor and sexual exploitations. The gang has women working as recruiting agents and marriage brokers. Poor and ignorant families are entrapped to sell their daughters under the pretext of bride price. Customary practices such as swara and bride price are becoming an easy source of exploitation for the traffickers. This trend is now catching up with poor Christian families as well. There are many who have disappeared without a trace.
The event was organized by ActionAid in collaboration with the NET, a local organization that works on the issue of gender based violence. Participants for the event consisted of representatives of local organizations, district government representatives of five central districts of NWFP, lawyers, media professionals and local district partner NGOs of ActionAid and the NET.
Brilliant Community Development Organization (BCDO), short term partner of ActionAid, organized a one day seminar on violence against women in Charsadda. MPA Mr. Alamzeb Khan Umerzai was the chief guest while more than 70 people from different walks of life participated in the program. This included men and women from local government, community activists, school teachers and representatives of local NGOs and CBOs.
Peace: Society for Human and Institutional Development (SHID) in collaboration with ActionAid, Peshawar office conducted a one day seminar on awareness raising on Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR) in one the remote villages of Mohmand Agency. The seminar was intended to sensitize youth of the area including students from colleges and young journalists etc. The speaker Advocate Abdul Rasheed gave detailed information about the black laws of FCR. The campaign on FCR was initiated from Mohmand Agency because it was the safest and most peaceful region among tribal areas but now the influence of Taliban has reached there particularly after the incidence of Red Mosque in Islamabad. Even they have made a Red Mossque in one of the famous shrines.
Governance: ActionAid-Pakistan in collaboration with Badin Rural Development Society (BRDS) held a one day workshop on corporate abuse in Hyderabad. A wider coordination committee, comprising the civil society activists from Sindh, was formed to stop the social and environmental abuses perpetrated by different oil and gas corporations in the province.
Khadim Hussain, Manager, Economic and Political rights Unit of ActionAid-Pakistan, while speaking at the occasion underlined the need for a sustained and concerted struggle to check the various forms of corporate abuse in the country.
Sawan Khan Babbar of Young Samaji Tanzeem, Johi, highlighted the violations of BHP Billiton, a multinational corporation, extracting oil and gas resources in district Dadu. He said that this company has not given due share to local people in employment. Out of its total 1435 employees, only 33 are from the Sindh province while the number of local employees is even lesser. He complained that all the royalty being paid by the company goes to federal government and nothing was earmarked for the development of local people.
Prof. Munawar of Anjuman-i-Ghulam Kashtkaran, Sawabi, highlighted the exploitation of tobacco growers in North West Frontier Province (NWFP). Notwithstanding the ever-increasing prices of tobaccos by-products, the incomes of tobacco growers were fast declining due to their exploitation by the middlemen and cigarette companies.
Muhammad Ali Shah accused the government of giving a free hand to deep sea trawlers. He said that the companies engaged in deep sea fishing are a great threat to the local fisher-folk as well as marine life.
