Booster of schools to receive Rankin peace award
Despite the danger, Greg Mortenson continues to ride “the gauntlet,” a stretch of road leading from Kabul to the villages of rural Afghanistan.
Mortenson, 46, directs the Bozeman-based Central Asia Institute, a nonprofit agency dedicated to building rural schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Last October, he was riding in a jeep toward Sarhad, a 44-hour drive from Kabul, when he stumbled upon a shootout between opium warlords. In the dark, Mortenson managed to move from the jeep to a truck carrying animal hides to a tannery. For eight hours, he rode in the back.
Through the institute he founded, Mortenson has been working for the last 11 years to build rural schools in Pakistan and more recently in Afghanistan. The Central Asia Institute funds 43 remote schools with 20,000 students, an enrollment that includes 9,000 girls. This year, using sweat equity provided by villagers, CAI built five schools in Afghanistan and four in Pakistan.
Mortenson, who returned in early November from a two-month trip to Pakistan and Afghanistan, will receive the Jeannette Rankin Peace Award from the Institute of Peace Studies during a ceremony tonight in the Alberta Bair Theater.
The peace award is named after Jeannette Rankin, the Montana native who became the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress in 1916. Rankin, a pacifist, voted against the United States entering both World War I and World War II. The Institute for Peace Studies at Rocky Mountain College attempts to promote alternatives to violence.
During the run-up to the October elections in Afghanistan, terrorists tried to further destabilize the situation by targeting foreigners. Mortenson rode through one area in a convoy of three Land Cruisers escorted by eight gunmen.
Despite instances of election fraud, he was encouraged by the commitment of the Afghan people to vote in their first election. In northeastern Afghanistan, he talked to a teacher who was four months pregnant. The teacher had walked for two days to register to vote and repeated the trip to cast her ballot. Nearly 90 percent of the eligible voters participated in the October election.
The Afghan people are grateful to the United States for kicking out the Taliban, Mortenson said, but many are concerned about the deteriorating security situation and the lack of foreign aid.
“The people there feel in the wake of Iraq that Afghanistan has been abandoned,” he said.
Fewer than 20,000 U.S. troops are in Afghanistan. Of those, about 80 percent are based in Kabul and Kandahar. Armed warlords control much of the countryside, and the booming opium production helps finance Al-qaida and Taliban forces.
Although $1.4 billion in humanitarian aid has been promised by Congress, Mortenson expects about $800 million to arrive in Afghanistan. Some funding has been delayed because Afghanistan lacks a central banking system to ensure accountability.
“To win the battle is easy, but to win the peace is very difficult,” Mortenson said. “It’s a pivotal time in world history. The decisions we make will affect generations to come.”
American foreign policy has become increasingly isolationist and unilateralist, he said.
“We need to build bridges of peace for our children.”
His experience in Central Asia supports research that indicates educating women is the key to raising the quality of life and health in developing countries. Centuries of illiteracy and ignorance are broken when schools open in rural areas, he said.
“My greatest joy is to see the first girl in a village walking to school the first day, knowing that she’s a role model and she’ll ultimately inspire hundreds of more girls. … It’s a simple walk from her house to the school, but it’s a monumental step. It’s like landing on the moon.”
The Central Asia Institute garnered national attention when it was featured in a Parade Magazine cover story in the spring of 2003. In 2003, Mortenson received the Al Neuharth Free Spirit of the Year Award and the Vincent Lombardi champion award. He has also received a U.S. congressional award for his innovative work and is one of a handful of foreigners who have received the Pakistan government’s highest honor for humanitarian service.
Mortenson’s mother and 92-year-old grandmother will be in the audience at the ABT when he receives the peace award.
Previous Rankin Peace Award recipients include Sen. Mike Mansfield, Sen. George McGovern, Native American educator Benjamin Pease, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen and the members of the Montana Logging and Ballet Company. During the evening’s ceremony, several Montana students will also receive awards in the Gronhovd Peace Essay Competition .
Donna Healy may be reached at 657-1292 or dhealy@billingsgazette.com
(c) 2004 Billings Gazette
