News:

On 25^th April 2015, it was reported that the US presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton cited the example of Indian women entrepreneurs joining forces to secure micro-finance loans as she made a clarion call to achieving equal pay, ending sexual violence and providing equal opportunities to women across the world. She told a gathering at the sixth annual "Women in the World" Summit at New York that men and women equally have to be the "agents of change" and contribute to the progress required to ensure an equal world for all. Exuding hope that the world is closer than ever before to achieving such change, Clinton cited the example of how women in India, Bangladesh and Liberia are joining forces to improve their lives and secure their rights. "We have seen women all over the world become agents of change, drivers of progress, makers of peace. I have seen penniless women in India and Bangladesh banding together to secure micro-finance loans and start their own small businesses," Clinton said to a packed audience of celebrities, entrepreneurs, activists and students. "So many women are still paid less than men for the same work, with even wider gaps for women of colour," she said.

(Source:http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/world/citing-india-hillary-calls-for-equal-pay-gender-equality/71905.html)

Comment:

The pretext of women empowerment has been used by the US and other western nations to colonize and loot the resources of the third world countries and Muslim lands since last century. These rosy promises like equal pay, ending sexual violence and providing equal opportunities have been made millions of times to the women of the world by these Capitalist politicians, only to result in more violence, sexual harassment and less respect for women. The US likes to make fools out of its own people as well as the people across the world by telling them that they are creating success stories by providing more jobs to women in the third world and developing countries, while in fact she and European countries are pushing the women in countries like India, Bangladesh and Pakistan to do jobs in humiliating conditions, with extremely long working hours and low wages, which barely feed them. These Capitalist nations, with their colonial mindset, want to achieve maximum profit out of the cheap labour force available in these poverty-ridden countries in fields like garment, textile, agricultural and other small industries. The living conditions for the majority of the population, in these countries is so poor, due to the interest based loans granted to them by the IMF and WB, with strenuous conditions, heavy taxes, high prices of utility goods and services; that the women are forced to leave the sanctity of their homes to do jobs in order to feed themselves and their families.

Moreover, Clinton describes the microfinance system as helpful to women, however the success stories are few while the majority of women who took loans in countries like India and Bangladesh are forced to pay huge amounts of interest for the rest of their lives. They have not been able to improve the standard of their living as promised by these micro financing institutions. For example the village in Bangladesh, Jobra, where Yunus of Grameen Bank pioneered his microcredit model is today just as poor as it was in 1970s while an increasing number of men in Jobra are now forced to undertake sporadic day-laboring jobs in nearby Dhaka and Chittagong to repay the installments on microloans that, in almost all cases have not lead to successful income-generating activities. The sexual harassment and objectification of women as a source of gratification for the males has increased rather multiplied under the Capitalist freedoms oriented system. The women in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and other countries are raped, tortured and humiliated under the sparkling promises of empowerment and equal opportunities. She has been fooled for more than a century now by the western liberal secular Capitalist system.

The western system of Capitalism has failed and no matter how hard they try to save it under the guise of women empowerment, it's a sham and has become a laughing stock for the realists.  Its time now to present the alternate model of system, a tested and reliable system, that worked brilliantly for more than 1300 years, only because it was not made by the limited mind of human beings, rather given by Allah (swt), the Creator of the universe, man and his small and limited mind. The system of Khilafah "Caliphate" that raised the status of women from mere objects and property to the highest ranks of mother, wife, sister and daughter, and where she was provided for, taken care of, protected and viewed as intellectual human beings. A system that ensured her basic rights like food, shelter, health and education in all circumstances and where she was fully able to pursue a profession of her choice without fear of being harassed or objectified. It is only this system of Khilafah "Caliphate" that can ensure the rights of women and her true liberation from the oppression of man-made systems in the future. This is the only system that can eradicate poverty as it did in the past. Allah (swt) says:

وَلَوْ أَنَّهُمْ أَقَامُواْ التَّوْرَاةَ وَالإِنجِيلَ وَمَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيهِم مِّن رَّبِّهِمْ لأكَلُواْ مِن فَوْقِهِمْ وَمِن تَحْتِ أَرْجُلِهِم مِّنْهُمْ أُمَّةٌ مُّقْتَصِدَةٌ وَكَثِيرٌ مِّنْهُمْ سَاء مَا يَعْمَلُونَ

"If they had observed the Torah and the Gospel and that which was revealed unto them from their Lord, they would surely have been nourished from above them and from beneath their feet. Among them there are people who are moderate, but many of them are of evil conduct." [TMQ: Al Mai'dah: 66]

Written for the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by

Ammara Tahir

Member of the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir