And her father has an important new job: on Dec. 9, Gordon Brown announced that Ziauddin would be his special adviser on global education.
But as Malala knows perhaps better than anyone else, the forces aligned against her are intimidating and entrenched. Although she has said through her father that she is determined to return to Swat, it’s quite possible that she will be forced to remain in England, where she has security and an unfettered opportunity to study. (The Pakistani government has promised to cover the cost of her education should she stay in the U.K.) That will only allow her critics — and there are many, including people who believe the shooting was staged or even invented — to insist that she and her family have forsaken the country they claim to care so much about.
In the face of such pressure, and after all she has been through, it would be understandable if Malala essentially retired at age 15. She may decide that she’s already done enough. Perhaps, in spite of the threats that are still directed at her, she will go back to Mingora to finish her education and raise a family, as is traditional for most girls and women in the region. There, her family’s home, a small gated compound shaded by a massive orange tree heavy with unplucked fruit, is watched over by family friends. Her tiny ninth-grade classroom on the second floor of the school is crammed with 31 students — and has one empty desk. Her best friend, Moniba, used a white correction pen to inscribe Malala in girlish cursive onto the desk’s battered wooden armrest. “This is Malala’s desk,” says Moniba, who sits at the adjacent seat. “It will stay empty until she comes back.”
If she doesn’t, all it takes is a quick scan of the school’s crowded classrooms to understand that there are 400 Malalas prepared to take her place. Not all of them will be as bold or articulate as Malala, perhaps. But each one has returned to Khushal with the full knowledge that Malala’s attackers are still at large. These girls have overcome fear to go to school. At the very least, they will fight for the right of their daughters, and their daughters’ daughters, to do the same. Malala’s classmates were already brave. She has made them, and girls all over the world, braver still.
— with reporting by megan gibson and sonia van gilder cooke/london and mehboob ali/mingoran
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