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Dear Friends,
Greetings from the Global Fund for Women!
While in the Democratic Republic of Congo this July and in Eastern Congo earlier this year, I met with 85 women’s rights activists. These women are unsung heroes of social change. They walk for miles, or travel long hours by jeep to meet with village leaders, militias and elected authorities. They speak out on egregious cases of sexual violence, rampant lawlessness, and the need for the government to fund access to health and education.
They inspired in me a feeling of hope and possibility in spite of the enormous tragedies and injustice that the Congolese people have endured for many years. As a Congolese woman living in the diaspora, I’ve felt a keen sense of responsibility to join other Congolese in raising awareness about the suffering in my homeland.
In the last three years, the Global Fund for Women has awarded $458,000 to 42 groups in the DRC. In July, we held a meeting with 35 women representatives from the organizations that we have supported in Western Congo. The groups expressed tremendous enthusiasm to learn from each other, to collaborate and to develop skills to become more effective change makers. Together, we visited projects in Kinshasa's vast neighborhoods, slums, and rural outskirts.
Global Fund grantees have formed a network that feeds policy recommendations to the Ministry for Women’s Affairs. While it is unusual for ministers to meet with grassroots organizations, the Minister for Women’s Affairs attended our meeting. The Global Fund grantee network is also meeting with United Nations agencies to jointly address critical needs throughout Congo –- including drinking water, jobs and security.
Americans who want to know how to support positive change in Congo should know about the groups funded by the Global Fund. These include the Society for Women Against AIDS, a group that organizes educates poor women to educate them on literacy, HIV prevention, voting rights, and credit and business management.
We also fund groups providing vocational training to homeless adolescents, hygienic maternity services in the slums and who work to prosecute rapists under Congo’s new sexual violence law.
After years of isolation and the death of four million people, Congo’s voices of change welcome all of us to be part of the solution. We must listen to the Congolese women, for they are speaking loud and clear, and they are working towards a Congo of peace, equality, and prosperity.
In Solidarity,
Muadi Mukenge
Senior Program Officer for Sub-Saharan Africa
Making Global Connections
The Global Fund is proud to announce the forthcoming book Women Who Light the Dark, by independent photojournalist and Global Fund donor, Paola Gianturco. This fall Paola, Betty Makoni and staff members from the Global Fund will travel around the country to bring you stories of women working to improve their communities. All proceeds royalties from Women Who Light the Dark go towards supportingto the Global Fund grantees.
Support the Global Fund by attending a Women Who Light the Dark event and buying a copy of the book!
Gruber Women's Rights Prize
We are pleased to congratulate Global Fund grantee, Pinar Ilkkaracan, co-founder of Women for Women's Human Rights in Turkey for winning the 2007 Gruber Women's Rights Prize. Pinar also co-founded the Coalition for Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Countries, a broad solidarity network that has pioneered reforms to anchor women’s equality in the legal system, and created a nationwide human rights program to enable women to exercise their rights in Turkey.
The Gruber Prize is a fitting recognition of Pinar's stellar leadership of these two organizations that have been pushing for greater gender equality in Turkish laws. Her work has made these laws accessible to women at the grassroots level, instigated advocacy efforts to promote sexual, bodily and reproductive rights in Muslim societies, and advocated on the international level for the advancement of women’s human rights. Pinar is a leading advocate for women’s human rights internationally and the Global Fund celebrates her $500,000 award from the Peter and Patricia Gruber Foundation.
Vote for the Global Fund!
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