Africa: West African women urge action on African Women’s Decade
Women leaders representing women’s human rights organisations, national women’s machineries and the media from 12 African countries in the West Africa sub region have called on Member States of the African Union to give high priority to the African Women’s Decade. The leaders, participating in a workshop in Accra, Ghana from 28-30 September 2010, entitled 'Beyond Beijing +15: Implementing and Resourcing the African Women’s Decade (2010-2020)' commended the African Union for declaring 2010-2020 a decade for African women. However, they stressed that in order to deliver on the objectives of the Decade, planning has to move from the continental level to the sub-regional (ECOWAS), national and community level.
For Immediate Release
30th September, 2010
West African women urge African leaders to give high priority to implementing the African Women’s Decade (2010-2020)
Women leaders representing women’s human rights organisations, national women’s machineries and the media from 12 African countries in the West Africa sub region have called on Member States of the African Union to give high priority to the African Women’s Decade.
The leaders, participating in a workshop in Accra, Ghana from September 28-30, 2010, entitled “Beyond Beijing +15: Implementing and Resourcing the African Women’s Decade (2010-2020)” commended the African Union for declaring 2010-2020 a decade for African women. However, they stressed that in order to deliver on the objectives of the Decade, planning has to move from the continental level to the sub-regional (ECOWAS), national and community level.
Participants emphasized that ‘business as usual’ is not going to deliver on the goals of the Decade. Women’s issues and machineries charged with women’s affairs have been marginalized and under-resourced for too long, and this has led to the very slow implementation of international and regional commitments made to women’s empowerment and gender equality.
Therefore participants called on governments to develop national action plans for the African Women’s Decade, ensure budgets are allocated to implementing the plans, and further ensure the plans are integrated into the national development plans/ poverty reduction strategy papers. Only by mainstreaming women’s concerns and gender equality into the national development agenda, can we really assure that they remain a high priority for African governments.
Finally participants were deeply concerned that Kenya, the country hosting the launch of the African Women’s Decade on October 15, 2010, has not yet ratified the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa. This is the premiere women’s rights instrument at the regional level, adopted by the African Union in 2003. Twenty – eight Member States have ratified this instrument thus far.
We call on the Government of Kenya to ensure that they ratify the Protocol before the launch of the Decade, as a sign of real commitment to advancing the rights of women and gender equality during the African Women’s Decade.
For more information, please contact: Patricia Blankson Akakpo +233 20 0458945 [email][email protected]; or Prof. Omolara Ogundipe +233 24 9858256 [email][email protected]; or Naisola Likimani [email][email protected]
Background
During the 12th Ordinary Assembly of the African Union, African Heads of States declared 2010-2020 the African Women’s Decade. The general goal of the Decade is to cascade, in concrete terms, the execution of commitments on gender equality and women’s empowerment from the grass-roots, national, regional to continental level.
Special focus will be on ten themes which are: Fighting poverty and promoting economic empowerment of women and entrepreneurship; Agriculture and food security; Health, maternal mortality and HIV and AIDS; Education, science and technology; Environment and climate change; Peace and security and violence against women; Governance and legal protection; Finance and gender budgets; Women in decision making positions; and Young women’s movement.
During the recent 15 year review of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the 10 year review of the Millennium Development Goals, it was found that while there has been some progress in women’s advancement in Africa, it has been slow and uneven, particularly in the areas of maternal mortality and reproductive health, where African women have the highest maternal mortality rate in the world. For the period 2000-2007, the ECOWAS Member States had maternal mortality rates ranging from 210 to 2100 deaths for 100,000 live births.
Note to Editors
The sub-regional workshop was organized by FEMNET, NETRIGHT and AAWORD.
The African Women’s Development and communication Network (FEMNET) is a regional, membership-based non-governmental organisation (NGO) set up in 1988 to promote women’s rights and development through sharing of information, experiences, ideas and strategies among African women’s NGOs as a strategy for strengthening their women’s capacity to participate effectively in the development of Africa.
The Network for Women’s Rights in Ghana (NETRIGHT), founded in 1999, is a coalition of civil society organisations and individuals who have a clear interest in working together to bring a gender perspective in national processes/programmes in ways that strengthens the work of individuals and organisations and advocate policy change.
The Association of African Women for Research and Development (AAWORD) is a pan-African non-governmental organization established in 1977 and based in Dakar, Senegal. AAWORD undertakes and supports research and training and advocacy with the intention of promoting the economic, political and social rights of African women.