Empowered Women Bring Change to Post-war Tajikistan

Thirty year old Soro’s life has changed. A divorced mother of three, she not only struggled to make ends meet but was treated with scant respect in her conservative community.

“I was alone and in despair,” Soro recalls. “After my father died, I moved in with my brother’s family, living from hand to mouth by sewing dresses.”

Now, one can hardly recognize this once-shy woman. A World Bank grant to empower women has transformed her. And she in turn has begun to transform her once alienated and war-torn community.

Poor, isolated, and inward-looking

Bibi Soro, as she is known, lives in the Buston Mahalla, an impoverished neighborhood on the dusty outskirts of Tajikistan’s capital, Dushanbe. As a woman in a conservative Islamic society, Soro grew up in strict Islamic tradition. 

Soro's remote and isolated community had long looked at outsiders with suspicion, and in the country’s bitter civil war, Buston's residents fought on the side of the militant Islamic opposition, holding out till the very last against central government control.

The loss of the war further alienated the disgruntled community. Homes were destroyed and families lost breadwinners -husbands, sons and brothers. Many of those who survived went to work in Russia, leaving the women behind with little means of support. Extended families sometimes housed 44 members under one roof, and food was often scarce.

With the opposition's forces still in operation, the community was like a tinder-box where stray sparks could at anytime reignite passions, leading to a renewed flare-up of violence.

A bold initiative to empower women

Preventing the recurrence of conflict in a post-war community is always a challenge, especially after a war is lost. Often, one of the best ways to bring about reconciliation is to empower the women of such communities to take on the mantle of leadership.

Accordingly, in 2002, the World Bank allocated a grant from the Post Conflict Fund to a U.S non-governmental organization, Counterpart International, for a Women's Empowerment Pilot Project. Doing so meant reversing the centuries-old social order in this troubled neighborhood.

“When I first discussed the idea of women’s empowerment with the Tajik government, they didn’t quite understand what I meant to do. However, from my previous work in country, they thought I could start a pilot in one of the most difficult post-conflict areas, where the opposition still operated and NGOs and donors didn’t dare to enter,”  said Hermine de Soto, the former World Bank’s project team leader.  “If we succeeded in Buston, the officials said, we would succeed anywhere in Tajikistan.”

Overcoming resistance 

And, a year since the project began, succeed they have. After first reassuring male relatives and community leaders that the project didn’t aim to convert the women to Christianity, the project has brought a marked change in the women.

Through workshops and training, the women have developed a new sense of confidence. Those who were unable to look their trainers in the eye now openly express their opinions and discuss business proposals with men on equal terms.

Over 200 women have joined the nongovernmental organization, ‘Bonuvoni Navovar’-- Tajik for ‘Women Innovators’. The women have been trained in business and job skills, and given access to credit.

In 2003 alone, some 85 women found jobs and received credit for animal rearing, retail, and small processing activities, enabling them to generate much-needed income. All loans have been repaid on time.

Where men once failed, the women tackle long-standing community problems

A bold women’s initiative has brought much-needed water to the neighborhood, tackling one of the community’s most enduring problems which the men were unable to solve for many years.

A center has been established where the women can meet and discuss broad community issues without depending on men. The center has trained women in healthcare, and now channels much-needed medicines to the new clinic, and provides computer training to the local school.

A bakery, Sladko-Ezhka or Sweet Tooth, has been set up to enable the Women’s Center to continue its activities by generating a steady income once World Bank assistance comes to an end.

And in a revolutionary move, the women have chosen their own leaders, a democratic tradition completely new to the community. These women leaders have traveled to other parts of the country as well as to projects in Kyrgyzstan to broaden their horizons and exchange experiences, putting an end to the community’s long isolation.

A success beyond imagination

“The Women's Empowerment project has been successful beyond my imagination,” says Andrea Burniske,  Counterpart International’s former local director. “By assuming leadership roles, these women have been able to address all the community’s priority problems. This has raised their stature within the community, and they feel proud of their achievements. Women members of Bonuvoni Navovar have acquired skills and knowledge that have changed their lives forever.”

Burniske cites an important lesson from experience, “Male community leaders are unlikely to empower women. Instead, it is innovative women - women who are willing to risk change- who can make a difference in their communities when provided with leadership skills and support."

De Soto agrees, “In the truest sense, because of everyone’s efforts, the women began to empower themselves.”  

Women as catalysts of change in conservative Tajikistan

“I wish we had had those seminars earlier,” says Bibi Soro wistfully, thinking of her lost years. ”They opened a new world before us....I learnt to use a computer and gained administrative and planning skills. And now I am the director of ‘Bonuvoni Navovar’,” she adds with her new-found sense of confidence.

As true vanguards of change in conservative Tajikistan, Bibi Soro and her colleagues plan to build on their pioneering successes by launching similar activities to empower women in other poor regions of the country. And this time, they have the support of the men