Nelson Banda is a 28 year old journalist from Zambia. 58 year old Moses Mbugua is the head of United Way Kenya, a non-profit that provides support for community programs. In November last year, both men took part in the Men's Traveling Conference - a group of more than 100 men from Zambia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi and South Africa who traveled across eastern and southern Africa to raise awareness and mobilize other men to support gender equality and end gender-based violence (GBV). The Traveling Conference was organized by the Men for Gender Equality Now Network, an initiative by FEMNET, the African Women's Development and Communication Network. FEMNET's programme on gender-based violence has been supported by the UNIFEM Trust Fund in Support of Actions to Eliminate Violence Against Women.

Aged 20 to 80, the Traveling Conference comprised faith leaders, policemen, lawyers, sportsmen, artists, students and persons living with HIV/AIDS. It was organized as part of the Sixteen Days of Activism - a worldwide campaign on ending violence against women that takes place each year from November 25th to December 10th. Billed as an advocacy and outreach event, participants traveled from their countries by bus to meet in Lilongwe, Malawi, stopping along the way to speak to thousands of people on issues of gender-based violence and HIV/AIDS. In each town they stopped at, the men used music, dance, drama and lively debate to captivate and involve their audiences. Buses were decorated with banners proclaiming "Peace in Africa Begins At Home: Men Fight GBV", and "Men Working to Stop the Spread of HIV/AIDS". Drums and megaphones helped to make the messages heard.
Speaking about his involvement, Banda says: "As men, we need to re-assess on how we have been socialized. Gender Based Violence is barbaric and serves nobody! We are in the Gender Revolution and as men we should take the lead and live by example."

Both Banda and Mbugua are active members of the Men for Gender Equality Now Network, which started in 2001 and has members from Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Somaliland, South Africa and Zambia. "When the network came up I joined immediately to continue in my campaign for gender equality," said Mbugua. "I have witnessed that when men talk to other men on gender equality they tend to pay more attention than when the same is coming from a woman."

FEMNET, the network's initiator, has been working for more than a decade in Africa to mobilize groups of men to combat gender discrimination. Believing firmly that even in the most patriarchal of societies there are many men who believe that there can be no development, peace and justice if gender inequality persists and if violence against women continues, FEMNET targets men as partners who are critical to reach out to other men to build awareness, sensitivity, and to change attitudes about male identity and unequal power relationships between men and women. "Gender bias takes two," says Sara Longwe, former president of FEMNET. "If we use advocacy to combat it, then both sides, men and women, must be involved. When you stand up for something, and do it publicly, you can change things."

Contact: Njoki Wainaina, FEMNET, [email protected]. Web site:www.femnet.or.ke