Daily Times

On the occasion of International Women’s Day, the Salman SuEi Foundation and UNDP Pakistan worked together to bring the historic Women on Wheels program back to Lahore. The inaugural ceremony took place on Tuesday at Rescue 1122 LOS, Lahore. Women on Wheels is a program focused on resolving women’s mobility woes by giving women motorbike training lessons, along with road safety and anti-harassment workshops and then facilitating them with employment opportunities as well as issuance of driving licenses. The initiative led by the Salman SuEi Foundation in collaboration with UNDP Pakistan aims to provide training to thousands of women by 2025.

So far the Salman SuEi Foundation has trained over 30,000 women under its brainchild, Women On Wheels program. This historical day was attended by prominent personalities such as the US Consul General, William K. Makaneole, who was invited as the chief guest; Rescue 1122 Director General, DrRizwan Naseer; renowned travel author and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, Salman Rashid; Executive Director of AGHS Legal Aid Cell, Miss. Nida Aly; OIC/Economic policy analyst SGD unit, Miss. Maheen Rashid and prominent Salman SuEi Foundation board members such as Miss. Zoe Khan and Mr. Mobeen Shafaat.

Furthermore, members of UNDP’s SGD’s unit (Copartner of the Women on Wheels Lahore Expansion program) were also present where they pledged full support to the initiative in all capacities. During the ceremony, the chief guest and other prominent supporters of the Salman SuEi Foundation gave their remarks on the Women On Wheels initiative. After which there was a ribbon cutting ceremony of the bikes which will be used for training, followed by a few females, who were previously trained by the Women On Wheels program, rode bikes for the guests. Salman SuEi, founder of the Salman SuEi Foundation, in 2016, launched a similar project with the Punjab government’s Strategic Reforms Unit. The Punjab project was eventually able to train 5,000 women in Eive districts of Punjab by the end of the campaign. Through this initiative, over 700 women were also provided subsidized motorbikes under this initiative. “Our Foundation aims to bring the same level of revolutionary change all over Pakistan. After the Lahore expansion, we will be further expanding to Multan, Rawalpindi, Peshawar etc”, commented Salman SuEi with regards to the Women on Wheels initiative.

The plan of the Foundation is to continue its momentum and graduate WoW trainees on a monthly basis in order to empower women of Pakistan and give them the necessary tools to lead an economically independent life.