LADY POWER:
Author and academic Betty Govinden lists some of the women who have transformed her life.
AUTHOR and academic Dr Betty Govinden believes in the power of the ordinary woman.
She shares her list of 12 inspirational women with SANTHAM PILLAY.
Although I have many more lists, here is my list of 12 inspirational women:
Phyllis Naidoo— teacher, lawyer, anti-apartheid activist and author.
Miriam Makeba— Grammy Award-winning South African singer and civil rights activist.
Rosa Parks— civil rights activist whose refusal to give up her seat on a bus helped end racial segregation in the US.
Lilian Ngoyi— South African anti-apartheid activist who was the first woman elected to the ANC’s executive committee.
Ela Gandhi— peace activist.
Victoria Mxenge— nurse, lawyer and anti-apartheid activist. Winnie Madikizela Mandela— activist, former head of the ANC Women’s League and politician.
Fatima Meer— writer, academic, screenwriter, and prominent anti-apartheid activist.
Aung San Suu Kyi— Burma’s democracy leader and Nobel peace laureate. Dr Kesaveloo Goonaruthnum Naidoo (also known as Dr Goonam) — medical doctor and antiapartheid activist.
Helen Joseph— antiapartheid activist.
Nokukhanya Luthuli— veteran activist.
For good measure, since we are in Women’s Month, all our grandmothers.
In all these lives, we see their fearless fight for justice, the extent to which they sacrifice their personal comfort for the general good, and their unwavering belief and dedication to the cause of freedom.
When I look at the lives of these women — some alive, others having passed on — I appreciate that they are all remarkable women.
Confronted by gross injustices, they choose not to look the other way.
They became pillars and leaders in the struggle for freedom, and have been fearless in taking a stand.
This position often comes at great personal cost — to themselves and their families — but they never waver.
Victoria Mxenge was martyred with her husband, Griffiths Mxenge. Phyllis Naidoo died without ever knowing who killed her son, Sadhan.
These women also go beyond the narrow understandings of “community”, generally understood in separatist ways.
They show a largesse of spirit, in their words and actions, dreaming of a time when people will cross over their divisions of race and creed, language and class.
They are also women with wisdom, as they respond with clarity to new challenges in a new historical moment.
We see this, for example, in the exemplary lives of Aung San Suu Kyi and Ela Gandhi.
When we think of these women, and so many more, we give thanks.