Khalida Zahir

Khalida Zahir (; 18 January 1927 – 9 June 2015), also recorded as Khalda Zahir, was a Sudanese doctor and women's rights activist. She is best remembered as one of the first two women to become physicians in colonial Sudan, alongside her classmate Zarouhi Sarkissian, and for co-founding the Sudanese Women's Union.

Early life and education Zahir, the first child of her parents, was born in Almorada, Omdurman to mother Fatima Ajab Arbab and father Zahir Surour Assadati (also recorded as Elsadati). From her parents and her father's eventual second marriage, Zahir would later have eighteen siblings. He had been raised by a single mother, as his father had died in the Battle of Omdurman on the same day that Assadati was born. Unity High School primarily educated the children of foreigners, and Zahir's attendance at the institution was met with disapproval by the family's neighbours. They graduated together in 1952, sharing the distinction of becoming Sudan's first woman physicians. Zahir completed postgraduate studies in the United Kingdom and Slovakia, specializing in paediatrics.

Student activism Soon after enrolling, Sarkissian and Zahir became active in student politics. They participated in the university's first demonstration in favour of Sudanese independence from foreign rule. Zahir was the most active of the two in political spheres, beginning with her participation in the school's students' union. The society's true objectives included hosting lectures on women's liberation, providing literacy classes for women, and establishing a kindergarten that later became a primary school in 1970. She was arrested, thus becoming the first woman in modern Sudanese history to be arrested on political grounds.

After beginning to participate in the activities of the Sudanese Communist Party in the late 1940s, Zahir became the first Sudanese woman to join a political party in 1949. She served as head of paediatrics at the Ministry of Health from the mid-1970s until she retired in 1986. The SWU was also successful in eliminating 'obedience laws' that forced women to return to abusive partners. Mass protests occurred throughout Sudan, including a demonstration on the 28th that saw peaceful protestors march towards the presidential palace. Nonetheless, the guards opened fire on the protest, killing and injuring attendees.

Recognition In 2001, the University of Khartoum awarded Zahir an honorary doctorate in recognition of her medical and political achievements.