‘Yes, women are vulnerable in such sorts of disasters, but how were they surviving otherwise?’

Name: Amna Shafqat

Age: 34 years old

Place of residence: Bonn, Germany

Occupation: Climate change and sustainability reporter (Forest Stewardship Council)

After trying to coordinate a time between Bonn and Karachi, I was finally able to talk to Amna on a Saturday evening. We began talking over zoom and the very first thing that Amna said was, ‘I stutter a bit so if you don’t understand anything, please feel free to ask. I hope that doesn’t bother you too much’. I assured her that I was not bothered at all, in fact I was grateful for her time.

Amna belongs to Dhamonkey which is a village in Sialkot and grew up with a twin sister, and four younger siblings – three sisters and one brother. When talking about her parents, she said that they were a ‘strange-mix’ - both religious and strict but very progressive when it came to education. Because her father was in the army, she grew up all over Pakistan but recalls Quetta with great affection – for its apple and almond trees and the ‘perpetual fall weather’.

Growing up all around the country was equal parts fun, and equal parts eye-opening for her. Moving to new places meant that they changed houses and school, but one thing never changed – patriarchy. Back in her village, people would often sympathize and wish for her a brother; because not having one was an anomaly. Once while riding on her bicycle, she was chased down by an extended cousin who told her that others were not happy with her roaming around like this because it would be of bad ‘influence’ to other girls in the village. This person was angry, but Amna was angrier.

Then later on after moving to Kashmir, she decided to step out on Bakra eid and witness the rituals that fascinated her, when her father’s friend very sternly claimed ‘You should go inside, you have no business here’.

Amna later on did her bachelors in Environmental Sceinces from Islamabad and then went on to do her master’s from Germany. In a tweet that gained much traction recently, she talked about how she came back to Pakistan because of ‘watan ki muhabbat’ (love for the homeland) and convinced her parents that she absolutely needed to come back and serve her homeland. Upon returning however, she was unable to find a job in Pakistan for a year and then applied to National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) for a research position. She inevitably had to ask her father to push her CV through to the NDMA because nothing was working out and he knew someone. Even after turning to her father’s commendation as a last resort, she was unable to get the job. ‘We only work with post-disaster management and you have studied only pre-disaster management’ is what the director told her. Which stands ironic ten years later when the flooding situation in Pakistan could have been managed and controlled if there had been pre-disaster risk management. The chairman further reasoned that even though this was not mentioned on the advertisement, they were only looking for a male employee because travelling to ‘hard-areas’ would be difficult for a woman. Amna later did went on to work for the World Bank for two years, but even there women were led down, kept out of important discussions and made to feel incompetent.

Besides the issues with regards to employment in Pakistan, as someone who has worked within the climate change sector, Amna pointed out an interesting fact – an overlap between climate change and gender issues. She told me that most reports on climate change talk about the vulnerability of women during flooding, such is the case with the recent floods in Pakistan, because it easier for them to do so. ‘Yes, women are vulnerable in such sorts of disaster, but how were they surviving otherwise?’ she asks me and then continues, ‘With the kind of poverty they have lived in, they work and put in place internal support structures that help them get by. They have committees (a way of saving money). Women in villages share food; if one has an excess of anything it is always shared with the other women’. While she agreed that such kind of structures can’t be valued economically, certain elements can still be adopted and built upon to survive an event like this mega flood. ‘Assistance and research is required, but men holding positions of power in such projects are not interested in solving these issues’ she concluded. It seems like sympathy is always easier to dish out in comparison to viable, sustainable solutions.

She thinks that in the coming years there will be worst disasters, and considering the fact that Pakistan is a crop-intensive country – it will create ripples within the economy and eventually effect people living in cities who seem to be unbothered by climate change. ‘I won’t suggest anything that hasn’t been said. Good measures are there, but the major problem is implementation’.

‘How do we work on implementation then?’ I asked.

‘There should be discourse around this. Maybe a bigger part dedicated to climate change in aurat march? People living in cities can formulate a politically motivating discourse. And then our government can take measures. Even Bangladesh has done it!’ Amna told me.

Having navigated work places with subtle sexism, and witnessing prejudices against women even when it comes to climate-reporting, Amna calls herself an ‘angry feminist’. She is angry because being angry is what paves way for a discourse. People only bat an eye to issues when it annoys them. Men are quick when it comes to ‘tone-policing’ a woman, but would easily overlook instances of discrimination. ‘Even with regards to aurat march, people claimed that they didn’t like the tone of the posters, but there was at least some discourse! It had shock value’ Amna adds on. While she believes that there is a feminist movement in Pakistan, for her it will truly be inclusive and impactful only when her cousins living in Daska, Sialkot, are able to talk about it.