Forum Theatre gives voice to internally displaced women in Ukraine
In an interactive theatre performance, women internally displaced by conflict in Ukraine shared the challenges they face integrating into their new communities with an audience of elected officials and representatives of civil society and international groups.Date:
On November 28, in Kyiv, Forum Theatre, an interactive theatre performance and dialogue allowed 20 internally displaced women from eastern, central and western Ukraine to play out their real-life challenges to an audience that included the Ministry of Temporarily Occupied Territories and Internally Displaced People, MPs and government, civil society and international organisation representatives.
Part of a UN Women project in collaboration with the Theatre for Dialogue NGO that is being implemented in three cities of Ukraine: Severodonetsk, Dnipro and Ivano-Frankivsk, Forum Theatre offered a powerful stage for the internally displaced women in Ukraine to play out their real-life challenges: Discrimination and stigma, domestic violence, violation of electoral rights, bureaucracy, and lack of housing and employment, among others.
Ukraine continues to experience conflict, instability and insecurity after the government lost control of ‘Donbas’, the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, to non-state armed groups. Directly affecting 3.9 million of Donbas’ 5.2 million people, the eastern conflict has had a significant negative impact on human welfare and social and economic conditions across the country.
"We talk about how the conflict’s consequences make life particularly difficult for internally displaced women,” says Ms. Nino Khodorivska, the event facilitator of the NGO Theatre for Dialogue. "Unable to count on their parents for help, who are left behind in territories no longer controlled by the government, these women must play three roles: Provide for their families under difficult circumstances; take care of housework and raise children; and serve as activists networking in their new communities.”
More than 63 per cent of Ukraine IDPs are women and children. IDPs are under-represented in decision-making processes that directly affect their lives, including peace negotiations and post-conflict recovery efforts.
During the interactive part of the event, the Minister of Temporarily Occupied Territories and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), Mr. Vadim Chernysh, MP Mariia Ionova and social activists replaced the actresses on stages, offered their own versions of the story, and then engaged in a lively discussion with the actresses and the audience.
“You have these problems in a very realistic way, and the Ministry knows about them,” said Minister Chernysh.
"It is important to show these interactive performances in every oblast in Ukraine,” said MP Mariia Ionova, co-chair of Parliaments’ Inter-Faction Union for Equal Opportunities.
The discussion brought authorities and performing participants together for a constructive dialogue.
“Women IDPs convincingly demonstrated that they are active members of Ukrainian society and have great potential for development and peacebuilding in Ukraine. This is what we also saw today," said Ms. Anastasia Divinskaya, Head of UN Women in Ukraine.
The research findings and results of the discussions were submitted to the Ministry as recommendations for the new Target Program for Recovery and Peacebuilding in the Eastern Regions of Ukraine.