Nuriyah laments Islamic women's groups

Nuriyah laments Islamic women's groups

YOGYAKARTA (JP): A Muslim woman activist has lamented the
failure of Islamic women's organizations to address issues such
as gender equality, leading to ignorance among activists.

Nuriyah Abdurrahman of Fatayat -- the women's wing of
Indonesia's largest Islamic organization Nahdlatul Ulama -- told
an international workshop on the role of Muslim women in the
antidiscrimination campaign here on Tuesday that most programs
offered by existing organizations barely touched women's need for
empowerment.

Some 87 percent of Indonesians are Muslims, of which more than
50 percent are women, she said. However, despite this majority,
programs have not been implemented to address the empowerment of
women, gender issues awareness, gender equality, and the
improvement of the status and position of women in society, she
said.

Most of the existing women's organizations provide only
Koranic reading classes and practical training on household
matters.

Nuriyah emphasized that Muslim organizations need highly
intelligent women to join the campaign against gender
discrimination.

"Most intelligent women here are busy working and therefore do
not have time to join organizations. On the other hand, the ones
actively joining such organizations are housewives who do not
have sufficient educations," said Nuriyah, who is the wife of NU
chairman Abdurrahman Wahid.

"It is now time to involve intelligent women in the strategic
policy-making processes in Muslim organizations," she said.

The four-day workshop was held by the Ford Foundation and
Fatayat, featuring women's rights activists from various
countries such as Yasmin Busran-Loa of the Philippines and Nabil
Abdel Fatah of Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic
Studies in Egypt and activists from prominent Muhammadiyah and
Ahmadiyah organizations. (23/edt)