Sinem Akgül-Newroz Dijwar/JINHA

SULAYMANIYAH – Women in the city of Sulaymaniyah, in the Federal Kurdistan Region, say their driving course aims to help women find work and to fight patriarchy in the region.

There are few legal guarantees for women in the workplace in the Federal Kurdistan Region, contributing to the low rates of women's employment. ŞilerGarip has spent the last six years operating a driving education course called Hewjin—unusual for a woman here. She says it is a struggle for women to be able to work.

"Women need to be able to work to be free and independent," she said. "If a woman isn't economically independent, she's tied to a man."

She says the first two years were difficult.

"Men would say, 'oh, you're going to teach us to drive?'" she related.

Şiler was born in 1966. She lost her mother at an early age and entered the workplace while still a child to take care of her five siblings.

"I was doing housework and working. I couldn't have a childhood," she said. She explained that this experience has shaped her efforts to fight women's exploitation in the workplace. Her father forced her to marry 34 years ago.

"We’re taking about a patriarchal Islamic system. Fathers don't go to their daughters and ask them, 'do you want to get married or not?' Women have to marry the people their fathers and brothers want," she said. She said that luckily, her husband and three children have now come to the biggest supporters of her working as a driving teacher, which she says many men here would not accept.

Şiler and her husband both worked actively in politics under the Ba'ath regime, Şiler often in the women's struggle. Now, she says, women's organizations are not very active. She saysworking women in the Federal Kurdistan Region need a union.

"Women here work more than eight-hour workdays, often in very difficult work. Pregnant women can only get 72 days off," she said."As Southern Kurdish women, we don't need jewelry, nice houses, dresses and cars. We need a women's revolution. We need to save women from being trapped between four walls."

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