Country of Origin:
Papua New Guinea
WLS Award:
2006-2007
About:
Graduate Program: Master’s Program in Participation, Power and Social Change at the University of Sussex, UK
Background & Goals: Sarah Maima Garap has been a community development practitioner for over two decades and has specialized in women and human rights issues throughout the Pacific region. Garap is the Founder and Director of MERI KIRAP SAPOTIM (Women Awake Support Them), a founding member of Kup Women for Peace, and the Women’s Counseling Centre, and is also a member of Women In National Governance Strategy (WINGS). She has written and published extensively on the subject of women, peace and security in the Pacific region, and has presented at a variety of conferences and symposiums, including the CEDAW National Conference in November 2005. She has worked with UNICEF, the Department of Justice, and the Attorney General in order to develop a human rights training module for local Village Courts in Papua New Guinea. Amnesty International cited her in their report on Women’s Human Rights in Papua New Guinea. Upon graduation, she hoped to measure women’s political engagement and strengthen women’s meaningful political representation in Papua New Guinea.
Post-Degree Projects: Garap completed her Master’s Program in Development, Power and Social Change at the University of Sussex in July 2007. In her thesis she argued for participatory governance from a gendered perspective and a bottom-up grassroots development model as a way to achieve progress in policy debates in Papua New Guinea.
In July 2010, Garap spoke about violence against women to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women in New York as part of a delegation from Papua New Guinea supported by Amnesty International Australia. See a video of her visit below.
