Speech on International Women’s Day at
Dubai Women’s College
March 8, 2004
Bismillah Ir Rahman Nir Raheem.
Dear sisters, ladies and gentlemen,
I am delighted to join you this morning on international women’s day.
This is a day where across continents and countries, women of different races, religions, cultures and histories meet together to demonstrate solidarity.
It is a special day for me as a woman, one I share with all my sisters.
It was in 1910, that a woman from Germany moved a motion at a conference to declare march 8 as international woman’s day.
How many mocked that one woman. How small she seemed against the sea of people who believed woman to be less than a man.
Yet in less than one hundred years that small woman who spoke up with one voice triumphed because she was speaking for a truth and a right:
The truth that men and women are born equal and must be treated equally.
This proves the old saying that each long journey begins with one small step.
My message to you is to always have the courage to make that step when you know in your heart that it is the right step to take.
That one woman was not afraid to speak up. She was not afraid that she would be mocked or shamed. She believed in her thoughts and fought for her rights. She began a campaign to collect signatures. Soon there were I million signatures for observing women’s day.
Now nearly every country in the world celebrates woman’s day and celebrates the power of what one woman can do.
Remember in life we women have nothing to fear but fear itself.
Reject fear and the fear of failure, you will climb the sweetest heights of success.
For me women’s day is a special day, a day of remembrance, a day of rededication to my sisters to stand with them.
Women have come a long way since 1910 and we still have to go a long way.
Our holy prophet, peace be upon him, condemned the practice of killing the girl child practiced in pagan times.
The killing of the girl child symbolised violence against woman when she was but a helpless infant.
Yet violence against women continues in different ways. Violence against women is wrong, it is immoral and we must stand up against this.
In observing women’s day, I salute all those men who believe in gender equality. Women’s rights are human rights. Human rights are indivisible. Therefore, men and women have a role to play in advancing the cause of women.
Sometimes it is a man who is an oppressor. Sometimes it is a woman who is an oppressor. An oppressor does not know gender.
In my case, I learnt about women’s rights from a very special man-my father.
He was the one who said one day to my mother, I do not want my daughter to wear the veil although I want her to dress modestly.
It was my father who insisted that I have a university education even though his sisters said, “don’t do that because no man will marry an educated woman”.
My success came because my father was a special man.
In my eyes president of UAE, his highness Shaikh Zayed is a special man and the ruler of Dubai, Shaikh Maktoum is a special man. They built these schools and universities so that the daughters of UAE and Dubai could get the best education the world could offer.
Education is the first step to success, to independence and to a satisfying life where the full creative and intellectual powers of a person are used to lead a stimulating, interesting and instructive life.
I am often asked how I became prime minister of a Muslim country. My reply is that I derived inspiration from the historical fact that the holy prophet of Islam, peace be upon him, married a working woman.
Yet through the mists of time, some of us, under colonialism, or tribalism or feudalism, lost touch with the roots of our religion.
Now once again, with the stress on education, on health facilities for women and on work opportunities for women, Muslim countries are beginning to awaken the creative force of their woman power.
My life is not the simple life I dreamt of when I was studying at Harvard university and at oxford.
I have lost my father when he was fifty years old. I lost two of my brothers.
Many thought that as a woman, I would break.
I did not because I believe that leadership is born of a passion. It is a commitment and it becomes life’s mission.
Women often have to make difficult choices. Sometimes choices that men do not have to make. Yet we make them because we must.
I grew up at a time of war. War in Vietnam. War between India and Pakistan.
The more I read about war, the more I wanted to work for peace and the peaceful resolutions of conflicts.
While I was at Oxford University, a British politician was threatening to throw all Asians into the sea. In hearing him I learnt about racial discrimination. I was determined to work for a world free of discrimination.
While I was at oxford, the British conservative party nominated Margaret Thatcher as their prime ministerial candidate.
I thought: if in England, then surely in Pakistan.
At oxford, I was the first female foreigner to win the presidency of the prestigious oxford debating society.
I had been told that as a foreigner I could not win and should not run.
I had been told that as a woman I could not win and should not run.
But I did run and I did win and in so doing I overcame my fear of losing.
I learnt to take risks.
Later I was told that because I was a woman I could not win the prime ministership of Pakistan.
Putting my faith in Allah and my trust in the love of the people of my country, I refused to take no for an answer.
I won because I refused to take no for an answer and because I believed that one individual, one woman, could make a difference.
So my message to all of you today is: don’t take no for an answer.
Be ready to take risks for what you believe in, what in your heart you know is right.
On this international women’s day, I urge women around the world not to accept no for an answer, not to accept restraints and constraints.
Remember Islam came as a message of emancipation putting an end to the humiliation of women.
This new century of ours must, for once and for all, be a century that values the girl child, that respects the woman, and protects its daughters, mothers and sisters in peace and in war, that honours and dignifies its women with economic freedom and allows us to be judged by our individual achievements.
My dear sisters and distinguished guests:
I wonder how many know that every hour one thousand children starve to death in the world.
As long as such violations of human rights exist, none of us, regardless of where we live, regardless of how comfortable our lifestyles, none of us are free.
I hope that your generation will succeed where mine failed.
I pray that you will succeed in building a better world, a world of peace, a world free of hunger, of pain and of suffering.
You are the leaders of tomorrow. Remember leaders do what is moral, they do what is right, they do what is necessary to build a better world.
And they don’t take no for an answer because they know one individual, one woman, can make a difference.
Thank You.