Malala Yousafzai
Malala Yousafzai
"Islam says that it is not only each child's right to get education, rather it is their duty and responsibility."
Malala was born on the 12th July 1997 in the Swat District of Pakistan. Malala grew up understanding the importance of education and education activism as her father was a school owner and educational activist; he owned a chain of schools known as the Khushal Public Schools. In 2009 the Taliban started to take control of the district where Malala lived banning girl’s education. The BBC Urdu website wanted to find a girl to blog about how the Taliban control was affecting her life and Malala volunteered, she was only 11 years old. In 2009 Adam B. Ellick made a documentary for the New York Times about Malala and her father and their fight for girls’ education.
In May 2009 war broke between the Taliban and the Pakistani army and Malala and her family had to leave Swat. They returned home in July 2009; during her time as a refugee Malala had decided she wanted to become a politician. When she returned home she became more involved in education activism and more active in the media appearing on and writing for local and international media including BBC Radio and Toronto’s Daily Star. As her media profile grew she started receiving death threats from the Taliban.
On the 9th October 2012 Malala was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman as she was on the bus coming home from school. She was targeted and the gunman asked the girls on the bus which one was Malala. The attempted assassination of Malala gained international reactions including responses from UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, Barack Obama and Madonna dedicated her song ‘Human Nature’ to Malala at a concert in Los Angeles the day of the attack.
Malala was airlifted to hospital and received treatment in Pakistan before being transported to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, England on 15th October 2012 to receive further surgery. She came out of her coma on the 17th October and was discharged from hospital on the 3rd January 2013. She now lives with her family in Birmingham.
Since the attack Malala has become an icon for the fight for girls’ education and the second Millennium Development Goal, which is universal primary education for all children by 2015. Former Prime Minister and The United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education launched a petition in Malala’s name campaigning for all children to be in education by 2015. On her 16th birthday Malala addressed the United Nations Youth Council about the importance of education for all children and how education can be used to tackle extremism and promote peace.
This day is also officially ‘Malala
Day.’ Malala met the Queen at Buckingham Palace in October 2013 and gave her a
copy of her autobiography ‘I am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and
Was Shot by the Taliban’ which was published in the UK on the 8th
October 2013. She also met with President Obama in October 2013. Malala has
established a fund in her name to provide education for girls around the World.
Angelina Jolie donated $200, 000 to the fund and with the first grant the fund
is educating 40 girls in the Swat Valley on Pakistan. Malala has also spoken at
Oxford and Harvard Universities and has been awarded an honorary degree from
Edinburgh University by Gordon Brown at a meeting with Global Citizen Committee
in October 2013. She won the 2013 United Nations Human Rights Prize in December
2013.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2014 was to
be awarded to Malala
Yousafzay for her struggle for the right of all children to
education.
See how Malala’s faith inspires her