‘SHE’S OUR MAN’ Liberia President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. AP
OSLO—Africa’s first democratically elected female president, a Liberian peace activist and a woman who stood up to Yemen’s authoritarian regime won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for their work to secure women’s rights, which the prize committee described as fundamental to advancing world peace.
The 10 million kronor ($1.5 million) award was split three ways between Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, peace activist Leymah Gbowee from the same African country and democracy activist Tawakkul Karman of Yemen—the first Arab woman to win the prize.
By citing Karman, the committee also appeared to be acknowledging the effects of the Arab Spring, which has challenged authoritarian regimes across the region.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee honored the three women “for their nonviolent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s rights to full participation in peace-building work.”
“We cannot achieve democracy and lasting peace in the world unless women obtain the same opportunities as men to influence developments at all levels of society,” the prize committee said.
Yemen protest leader
Committee chair Thorbjorn Jagland said he hoped the prize would bring more attention to rape and other violence against women as well as women’s role in promoting democracy in Africa and the Arab and Muslim world.
Karman is a 32-year-old mother of three who heads the human rights group Women Journalists without Chains. She has been a leading figure in organizing protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh that kicked off in late January as part of a wave of antiauthoritarian revolts that have convulsed the Arab world.
“I am very very happy about this prize,” Karman told The Associated Press. “I give the prize to the youth of revolution in Yemen and the Yemeni people.”
No leaders of Arab Spring
Citing the Arab Spring alone could have been problematic for the committee. The unrest toppled authoritarian regimes in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. But Libya descended into civil war that led to Nato military intervention. Egypt and Tunisia are still in turmoil. Hardliners are holding onto power in Yemen and Syria and a Saudi-led force crushed the uprising in Bahrain, leaving an uncertain record for the Arab protest movement.
Jagland said it was difficult to find a leader of the Arab Spring revolts, especially among the many bloggers who played a role in energizing the protests, and noted that Karman’s work started before the Arab uprisings.
RIGHTS WARRIOR Leymah Gbowee of Liberia. AFP
“Many years before the revolutions started she stood up against one of the most authoritarian and autocratic regimes in the world,” he told reporters.
Liberia was ravaged by civil wars for years until 2003. The drawn-out conflict that began in 1989 left about 200,000 people dead and displaced half the country’s population of 3 million. The country—created to settle freed American slaves in 1847—is still struggling to maintain a fragile peace with the help of UN peacekeepers.
Harvard graduate
Sirleaf, 72, has a master’s degree in public administration from Harvard University and has held top regional jobs at the World Bank, the United Nations and within the Liberian government.
In elections in 1997, she ran second to warlord-turned-president Charles Taylor, who many claimed was voted into power by a fearful electorate. Though she lost by a landslide, she rose to national prominence and earned the nickname, “Iron Lady.” She went on to become Africa’s first democratically elected female leader in 2005.
Sirleaf was seen as a reformer and peacemaker in Liberia when she took office. She is running for reelection this month and opponents in the presidential campaign have accused her of buying votes and using government funds to campaign. Her camp denies the charges. The election is Tuesday.
In a 2005 interview with The Associated Press, Sirleaf said she hoped young girls would see her as a role model and be inspired.
“I certainly hope more and more of them will be better off, women in Liberia, women in Africa, I hope even women in the world.”
‘She’s our man’
“If you’re competing with men as a professional, you have to be better than they are … and make sure you get their respect as an equal,” Sirleaf said. “It’s been hard. Even when you gain their acceptance, it’s in a male-dominated way. They say, ‘Oh, now she’s one of the boys.’”
Buttons from her presidential campaign say it all: “Ellen—She’s Our Man.”
The committee cited Sirleaf’s efforts to secure peace in her country, promote economic and social development and strengthen the position of women.
Jagland said the committee didn’t consider the upcoming election in Liberia when it made its decision.
“We cannot look to that domestic consideration,” he said. “We have to look at Alfred Nobel’s will, which says that the prize should go to the person that has done the most for peace in the world.”
Emboldening Liberian women
Gbowee, who organized a group of Christian and Muslim women to challenge Liberia’s warlords, was honored for mobilizing women “across ethnic and religious dividing lines to bring an end to the long war in Liberia, and to ensure women’s participation in elections.”
Gbowee has long campaigned for the rights of women and against rape. In 2003, she led hundreds of female protesters through Monrovia to demand swift disarmament of fighters who preyed on women throughout Liberia during 14 years of near-constant civil war.
In 2009, she won a Profile in Courage Award, an honor named for a 1957 Pulitzer Prize-winning book written by John F. Kennedy, for her work in emboldening women in Liberia.
Gbowee works in Ghana’s capital as the director of Women Peace and Security Network Africa. The group’s website says she also won a 2007 Blue Ribbon Award from Harvard University and was the central character of an award-winning documentary called “Pray the Devil Back to Hell.”
‘MOTHER OF REVOLUTION’ Tawakkul Karman of Yemen. AFP
The group’s website says she is a mother of five.
“I know Leymah to be a warrior daring to enter where others would not dare,” said Gbowee’s assistant, Bertha Amanor. “So fair and straight, and a very nice person.”
Spirit of Yemeni revolt
Yemen is an extremely conservative society but a feature of the uprising there has been a prominent role for women who turned out for protests in large numbers.
Karman is from Taiz, a city in southern Yemen that is a hotbed of resistance against Saleh’s regime, and now lives in the capital, Sanaa. She is a journalist and member of Islah, an Islamic party. Her father was a former legal affairs minister under Saleh.
Long an advocate for human rights and freedom of expression in Yemen, she has been campaigning for Saleh’s ouster since 2006 and mounted an initiative to organize Yemeni youth groups and opposition into a national council.
On Jan. 23, Karman was arrested at her home. After widespread protests against her detention—it is rare for Yemeni women to be taken to jail—she was released early the next day.
Karman has been dubbed “Iron Woman,” “The Mother of Revolution” and “The Spirit of the Yemeni Revolution” by fellow protesters.
During a February rally in Sanaa, she told the AP: “We will retain the dignity of the people and their rights by bringing down the regime.”