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Asia's women leaders

prove touch survivors

in 'cutthroat world'

WASHINGTON: South Asian politics is dominated by women leaders who have proved tough survivors in a "cutthroat world," Washington Times said today.

In a report on political trends in South Asia, the paper noted that while Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are ruled by women leaders, Sonia Gandhi," the enigmatic" widow of Rajiv Gandhi, will be influential player in the forthcoming Indian elections, even though she does not hold political office.

The paper said there is more than just the family name or sympathy factor that propelled most of these women politicians into power and recalled how Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan and Sri Lanka President Mrs. Chandrika Kumaratunga outmanoeuvred their opponents to assume power.

"In a part of the world where the bullet and the bomb are as likely to end a politician's career as the ballot box, the widows and daughters of murdered national leaders are cornering the top jobs, " the paper said while pointing out that it is not the textbook feminist strategy for promoting the rights of women in a region where they are historically downtrodden and ignored. But the subecontinent's tradition of politics dominated by dynasties and steeped in blood has thrown up an unprecedented crop of female prime ministers and presidents.

The report said the paradoxical trend toward matriarchal politics in South Asia may have been sparked by the sympathy factor and voters' hopes that the aura of the deal leaders had rubbed off on their female relatives.

"But these women also have proved themselves to be tough survivors in a cutthroat world," the report said adding that for most of these women, the entry into politics has been brutal and sudden and that there is more to the phenomenon than simple sympathy and the family name.

"For women, the family connection is usually the only access to political life," the paper quoted an Indian feminist Urvashi Bhutalia who added:" But these women have had to be strong enough to make the running. Their presence shows that women can do the top jobs."-AFP