Some
of this may be dispiriting, but there are countless reminders that aid is
sometimes transformative even in settings that might seem hopeless, and that
American and overseas organizations can cooperate in ways that are
breathtakingly successful. A case in point is Dr. Hawa Abdi, a Somali woman who
is equal parts Mother Teresa and Rambo. Sixty-six years old, she is a
diminutive woman with a brown complexion and a warm smile that conceals nerves
of steel. She wears colorful dresses and head coverings, and day in and day out
she works in one of the toughest environments for a doctor in the world. When
she was twelve years old, her mother died in childbirth, so she resolved to
become a doctor and save the lives of other pregnant women. An excellent
student, Abdi while still a teenager won a scholarship to study medicine in
Russia. She earned a medical degree, specializing in gynecology, and also a law
degree, and then in 1983 she opened a one-room clinic on her family land. She
offered medical help to impoverished Somali women. The number of patients
steadily grew, and so did the clinic.
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When
Somalia fell into civil war, Dr. Abdi turned her land into a displaced-persons
camp as well as a medical center. Eventually 90,000 people - 1 percent of
Somalia's population - crowded onto her 1,000 acres of land, and her one-room
clinic grew into a 400-bed hospital. She managed the entire encampment and
started schools for children that were so well run that students were three
grades ahead of those in the capital, Mogadishu. Worried that handouts would
breed dependency, Dr. Abdi taught displaced people how to plant new crops and
even started training former animal herders to fish in the sea. She advocated
tirelessly for an end to female genital mutilation, which in Somalia takes a
particularly extreme form, with a girl's genitals entirely cut off when she is
about ten years old and the vaginal opening sewn up with wild thorns. This is
excruciatingly painful and also makes childbirth more dangerous when the girl
grows up. Dr. Abdi promoted women's empowerment in every way she could, and
even ran a small jail in her encampment - for men who beat their wives.
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Somali
Islamic militants were appalled at the idea of a woman running such a large
enterprise, so a warlord from the hard-line Hizb al-Islam, or Party of Islam,
ordered her to hand over operations to his men. Dr. Abdi refused. "I may
be a woman," she said, "but I'm a doctor. What have you done for
society?" The Party of Islam then attacked the hospital with 750 soldiers,
destroying equipment and the operating theater. Over the following days, there
was growing outrage among Somalis at this assault on one of the country's few
functioning institutions, and the warlord - taken aback at the furor - backed
down. He now ordered Dr. Abdi to run the hospital under his direction. She
refused. Each day for a week, the militia demanded that she obey, and she
steadfastly refused to budge. Indeed, she insisted that the militia should not
only leave at once but also write out an apology.
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"I
was begging her, 'Just give in,' " recalls Deqo Mohamed, her daughter,
also a doctor. "She was saying, 'No! I will die with dignity.' " It
didn't come to that. The Party of Islam grew tired of being denounced by
Somalis at home and abroad and eventually slunk off - and wrote the apology
that Dr. Abdi demanded. With the help of Vital Voices, an aid group for the
world's women that Hillary Rodham Clinton had helped found, Dr. Abdi rebuilt
her hospital and went back to helping her people.
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The
partnership of Vital Voices and Dr. Abdi is a useful model.
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Typically,
it's the local people on the ground, such as Dr. Abdi, who have the knowledge
and connections to get the most done, and in places such as Somalia they also
don't raise sensitivities about foreigners imposing alien values on a local
culture. Locals also tend to operate much more cheaply than foreigners, for
they don't need convoys of SUVs and international flights for home leave. The
locals may lack the back office skills in accounting, public relations, and
fundraising, as well as the most recent research on what interventions work.
That's where the marriage between an international group such as Vital Voices
and a local leader such as Dr. Abdi can be very effective. Vital Voices can
raise money for Dr. Abdi, provide administrative and research expertise, and
generate international outrage when she is threatened, and she can do the work
on the ground, where she has the edge.
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We've
seen many examples of indomitable courage, but it's hard to beat Dr. Abdi and
Vital Voices for the combined strength they bring to their work in Somalia, and
for the change they accomplish together on the ground. And if one indefatigable
woman can make a difference for tens of thousands of people even in a war zone,
that should renew our own fortitude. Sure, charitable organizations need to get
better, but no one who has seen an eager Somali child studying in a refugee
camp school can doubt the good that they can achieve.
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Nicholas
Kristof & Sheryl WuDunn "A Path Appears" (2014)
