February 19, 2017 – Pakistan Gender News

February 19, 2017February 20, 2017

Nadra lady officer accuses seniors of sexual harassment

ISLAMABAD – A female officer of the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) has levelled serious allegations of victimisation and sexual harassment in the workplace by some senior officers of the authority including its former deputy chairman.

NADRA Deputy Assistant Director Syeda Shaheen Bokhari had alleged that she was running from pillar to post to get justice but to no avail rather she was being victimised persistently.

Bokhari said that she has not only been denied promotion for raising voice against her alleged tormentors and harassers but also continued to face internal inquiries one after the other “to teach her a lesson” and now she was being harassed in the name of getting arrested through the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

The female officer has already approached the Federal Ombudsperson seeking protection against alleged harassment by the senior NADRA officers.

Bokhari while talking to The Nation said that former deputy NADRA chairman Syed Muzaffar Ali not only sexually harassed her as an inquiry officer but also created hurdles in her promotion when she refused to accept his “private offers”. “All of my colleagues have been promoted to the next grade but I am still working on the same pay scale because I have raised a voice in this male-dominated society,” she said. She has also mentioned all these apparent “facts” in her application to the office of Federal Ombudsperson.

The ordeal of woman officer started when she filed a sexual harassment case in 2009 against Kamran Latif, the then NADRA director production CNICs. The matter was resolved after Ehtesham Shahid, the then DG production CNICs intervened as a mediator and a guarantor and assured her that the episode would not happen again, she said.

He ordeal started soon after the NADRA management changed hands in 2014 and NADRA high-ups started an inquiry against her accusing her stealing 28 CNICs (computerised national identity cards) from the production section of the NADRA headquarters.

The woman officer said that the inquiry against her was initiated to “teach her a lesson” for filing a harassment application against Latif. She said that NADRA authorities later withdrew the inquiry when the Lahore High Court on her petition found that the competent authority did not even duly sign the inquiry report.

“During the proceedings of the inquiry in 2015, the then DG (operations) Syed Muzaffar Ali Shah asked me that ‘you would have to pay the price’ to close the inquiry against me,” she said explaining how she was harassed. Muzaffar Shah is currently working as DG admin, HR and data-ware house and was recently removed as deputy chairman on the orders of the LHC.

In the middle of 2016, a promotion board of NADRA denied Bokhari promotion and Muzaffar was also a member of the board. In September last year, a fresh inquiry was initiated against Bokhari accusing her of submitting fake medical bills of her mother to NADRA for reimbursement. “I am facing an inquiry of Rs9,000 on account of the alleged fake bills, who will believe this,” she said adding that this was a clear case of victimisation.

She said that first, the finance department informed her in writing that the file of the medical bills had gone missing from the DG admin office headed by Muzaffar.

“Now I have been charge-sheeted for submitting fake and unverified bills and DG (Operations) Brig (retd) Nisar has been appointed an inquiry officer,” she said.

“Now a case against me has also been forwarded to the FIA and I am being threatened to get arrest through the agency,” she said adding “there seems no end to my miseries”.

NADRA Spokesman Faik Ali declined to comment on the issue. A senior officer of the authority wishing not to be named said all the allegations against the senior officers were baseless. He said that some inquiries were pending against the female officer and she was trying to pressurise the authority by levelling unfounded and baseless allegations.

A spokesman for the interior ministry said that the complainant should file a complaint to the relevant forum and she would surely get justice if her allegations were founded to be true.

The Nation

February 19, 2017February 21, 2017

http://nation.com.pk/karachi/19-Feb-2017/female-journalists-demand-resolution-of-their-problems

By Hina Butt

Politics is not a common profession for women in Pakistan. The recent Global Gender Gap Report ranked Pakistan at 143 in economic participation and opportunities and 87 in political empowerment. In the Punjab Assembly only 8 women were able to get elected under the general seats making 75 women out of 371 seats in the assembly. The situation is even worse as in Pakistan every 10th women experience violence during the time of pregnancy and 52 percent of these victims keep their abuse a secret. This shows an alarming situation of our social mind set

People always ask me what difference I was able to make in the status of women in Pakistan during my term in the Punjab Assembly. Looking at the past performances of the Assembly, for me this is not a question but rather a lack of optimism. Last few years were very inspiring as we were able to make many important decisions to protect and to facilitate women in the province through Punjab Assembly. Most prominent of these legislations was the Punjab Commission on the Status of Women Act 2014. The criticism received by this act even led to some important amendments in it and without much delay it was again passed as the Punjab Commission on the Status of Women Act 2016. Although these rights are already envisioned by the Constitution of 1973 but the act gave a system to protect their right of empowerment and discrimination in gaining equal socio-economic opportunities.

Similarly, reporting and rehabilitation structure proposed through the Punjab Protection of Women against Violence Act 2016 gave much awaited security to women from numerous types of violence in the province. The Punjab Fair Representation of Women Act 2014 supported women by giving them better opportunities in decision making bodies in the province. This act led to appropriate amendments in more than 60 Acts passed by the Punjab Assembly. To further protect and facilitate women, amendments were passed in Punjab Maternity Benefits Ordinance, 1958 in 2016 and also recommended in the Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 in 2015. Such parliamentary actions show that the efforts of this assembly are applaud-able.

Despite the presence of such legislations, there are continuous and increasing reports of miss-treatment with women. Whether at work or at home women are still discriminated and stereotyped. Punjab Assembly can only provide seeds to improve the situation; the watering and the maintenance of the land need to be done by the administrative and judicial systems. If we want to gain confidence of women and their families, then only collective efforts can ensure a strong base and fruitful growth of the social structure in Pakistan. When we look at women rights in Pakistan, unfortunately, there are limited success stories and role models. To see the actual results of these achievements of law enforcement agencies and the implementations of laws we have to make rigorous and sincere efforts to design and implement future and present strategies for women empowerment. Hence, all hope is not lost; change for women is happening in and through political arena in Pakistan.

The writer is a graduate of LUMs and currently serves as a member of the Punjab Assembly.

The Nation

February 19, 2017February 21, 2017

Issues of women journalists discussed

A team of women journalists and publishers met the secretary information on Saturday.

They discussed several issues pertaining to the women journalists and publishers.

Information Secretary Imran Atta Soomro said their problems would be resolved on a priority basis. “The women journalists play a vital and positive role in the society.”

He said it was the government’s moral responsibility to solve their problems.

The delegation included Fauzia Shaheen, Zahida Abbasi, Haseena Jatoi and Sidra Khattak. The journalists pointed out they were not invited in the government programmes.

The News

February 19, 2017February 21, 2017

Fight like a girl – empowering women for self-defence

By Natasha Raheel

KARACHI: “Fight like a girl” can be derogatory term but not for MUV Base, a gym in Karachi aimed at revolutionising traditional workout routines, which has used the slogan to name a course aimed at empowering women to defend themselves against violence.

The course focuses around incorporating capoeira, a Brazilian martial arts form, to learn self-defence and is the second part of the series by MUV Base with the first part revolving around ‘weapon disarmament and counter-attack’.

MUV Base owner Mehak Taherani wants her gym to be useful in educating people and believes that self-defence courses are needed in a country like Pakistan, especially for women who have to face such incidents like harassment and violence not only on the streets, but unfortunately in their homes as well.

“The self-defence courses are not to teach people that they should flaunt their skills and pick fights, it is about how to deal with difficult situations, and women in Pakistan have to face these situations a lot,” said Taherani.

Meanwhile, Amir Khan, instructor for the courses, revealed that due to the problems faced by women in society, he had to come up with a specialised programme to deal with these issues.

“I wanted to design a system which is easy to learn and is effective,” Amir, who is trained in capoeira and has more than 10 years of experience in self-defence after working as a provincial Offenses Officer in Ontario, told The Express Tribune.

“I designed this programme so that women can learn basic self-defence techniques; things that they can relate to. These are just not kicks and punches; these are real-life situations. If you are choked against the wall, or on the floor, how do you get out of them? These are very essential things that everyone should learn, not only women.”

Amir, who is a certified instructor of unarmed combat and weapon disarming, added that basic training in self-defence can also induce confidence in an individual, which can intimidate the likely attacker.

“Confidence is the key. Since I’m trained I feel confident because I know how to protect myself and everyone should feel that way. A lot of times people get hurt because they don’t portray confidence,” he said.

As far as the disarming classes are concerned, Amir said that the course was aimed at leaning how to deal with a situation where a person had to disarm a hand gun, knife, stick or a pipe; all things that are commonly used in physical assaults.

He concluded that the participants have been very responsive in asking questions, while he makes sure his students tell him the feedback along with a recap of the day’s lesson, and the techniques are designed for people who have not practiced martial arts before. “My job is to show the tools but they need to practice regularly to stay fluent in it,” he said.

The Express Tribune