Think long & hard about just how many things are not happening for women & girls – Professor Shameem

The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Fiji, Professor Shaista Shameem says International Women’s Day is usually a day when we tell everyone just how little the situation of women has improved over the past 12 months, decade, century or millennium.

Shameem says every year on this date, we sadly report on how many CEOs are not women, how many parliamentarians are not females, how many women and girls around the world do not have food or water or basic amenities, how many women still suffer from poverty, lack of education and employment, and how many of them continue to suffer from abuse, violence in the home and in society, trafficking, homelessness, and the sheer drudgery of everyday life where nothing seems to improve and there is nothing to look forward to but the same sad situation repeated endlessly like a broken record.

She says all of these still remains the same and is probably worse in 2022 due to the ill-effects of COVID-19 and the economic downturn caused by the pandemic in Fiji and the world.

While speaking at the University’s International Women's Day Celebrations today, Shameem urged everyone at the University of Fiji to think long and hard about just how many things are not happening for women and girls despite our move into the third decade of the 21st century.

She says this year, they thought to do things a little different as their administration team, with ideas coming from all over the University, decided to mark International Women’s Day as a festival where they focused on a photo exhibition, a documentary film festival about women and International Women’s Day and book launches by women.