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Carrying the torch, lighting new paths: Women and leadership
While our grandfathers passed us the torch, and Kartini broke the first walls, we still find ourselves building the path as we walk it.
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Students of SD Bromantakan 56 state elementary school write about their aspirations for the future on April 19, 2024 at Ngarsopuro Market in Surakarta, Central Java, during a public activity to mark Kartini Day, which falls on April 21. (Antara/Maulana Surya)
“You are the eldest of your generation. You must lead.” These words, spoken to us by Eyang BJ Habibie (also known as Rudy) and Eyang Fanny Habibie, have echoed across our lives, an inheritance not just of name, but of responsibility.
As the firstborns of our generation in the Habibie family, leadership has never felt like a choice. It was both an expectation and a quiet command. Yet, stepping into that role as women has revealed to us that leadership, for us, would never quite look the same.
Our grandfathers, brilliant, visionary and devoted to Indonesia, led in ways that made the impossible possible. Their legacies are etched in the nation’s history. But the truth is, we cannot follow their footsteps exactly. Not because we do not admire them, we do, but because the path they walked was built differently.
They spoke of hard work and luck, of timing and opportunity. But they never had to mention not being allowed in the room. And yet, while the room now exists, thanks to Raden Ajeng Kartini, who dared to challenge the norms of her time, the doors still are not always open for women.
Kartini did not just live her resistance, she wrote it. Through letters, she poured her thoughts and dreams onto the page. Her words became thought, then belief, then quiet power, carried not through noise, but through steady, persistent ink.
Generations later, her writings continue to stir questions, awaken courage and shape ideas we are only now beginning to live.
The walls may be less visible, but they have not disappeared.
