Politics
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The fault of our generation
Last week, I was invited to participate in a panel on Gender the Youth SDG Summit, UNITE2030. Totally up my street, I thought, as I scribbled my key messages: post 2030, its time for gender equality to be the norm… let’s broaden the narrow focus of gender in SDG 5 to include LGBTIAQ+… this, I can do in my sleep, I thought cockily. What else? Young people are incredible advocates and activists, but it is time to move from activism to influencing policy, so how about making that shift, being part of the democratic process and changing the system from within? Agitate to increase women’s representation in local bodies and…
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Afghanistan – since I had to…
I volunteered to work for the polio programme in Afghanistan in 2008, fresh from my first international assignment in Nigeria. It was only in 2010 that this materialised. I spent half a year with UNICEF working on eradicating polio, a job that came quite naturally to me since I wrote my book, but nothing had prepared me for the complexities that came with working in a country that had only known conflict. At the end of six months, I was weary and weatherbeaten. But Afghanistan was a drug that was hard to shake. So I returned. This time, I transitioned from polio (and public health) to regional integration and from…
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#NoCoverUp
Are we really surprised about the spate of domestic violence unleashed by the COVID-19 pandemic? This brief by UNWOMEN has estimated that globally, 243 million women and girls between the ages of 15 and 49 have experienced sexual and/or physical violence perpetrated by an intimate partner in the previous 12 months. “This number is likely to increase as security, health, and money worries heighten tensions and strains are accentuated by cramped and confined living conditions.” What was that last sentence again? It almost sounded like a justification for domestic violence. As the world attempts a feeble recovery from the pandemic, economic uncertainty will continue for a long time. More people…
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Farm to Capital
Like most great teachers, Professor MS Swaminathan offers the most profound lessons through his experiences. It is up to his students to learn from his mistakes and (attempt) not repeat them. A few decades ago, when I was still a rookie in the practice of development, he narrated an anecdote from the Green Revolution. He was in one of the north eastern states of India, introducing High Yielding Varieties of rice to cultivators. Since gender roles are fluid in most communities, men and women – young and old; as well as children had gathered and hung on to every word he said. Soon, there was time for questions. An old…
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Democracy 1.0 (or five remarkable things about the 2020 US Elections)
It’s coming from the sorrow in the street,the holy places where the races meet;from the homicidal bitchin’that goes down in every kitchento determine who will serve and who will eat.From the wells of disappointmentwhere the women kneel to prayfor the grace of God in the desert hereand the desert far away:Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. Democracy, Leonard Cohen Yes, like millions across the world, I was glued to my TV from November 4th until finally, CNN called the winner of the hotly contested electoral battle of 2020. Like everything about this year, the Presidential elections were unlike any other. For one, there was were just one two significant debates…