Source: Cameroon Tribune
With their Charter of Values adopted, signed and proclaimed they are now set for the training of women project-makers.
Source: allAfrica
Imagine a future Africa where patriarchy is dead and more women are economically empowered to provide for their own basic needs; one in which they continue to shatter the proverbial glass ceilings to occupy top leadership positions in all spheres.
The kabaka of Buganda, Ronald Muwenda Mutebi has underscored the importance of gender equality as a key tool in the development of families and a stronger society.
“Men and women are equal partners in development. I call upon women to engage in income generating activies. When women are empowered economically, families and the entire society flourish” the Kabaka said.
Source: BBC News
Algerian political parties have agreed to show female candidates' faces after some posters displayed blank avatars instead, the state news agency says. Parties in Bordj Bou Arreridj Province had been showing hijabs surrounding blank spaces alongside photos of male candidates. On Tuesday the election authorities gave parties two days to display photos or be removed from the vote. An official said the practice was illegal.
"This kind of encroachment is dangerous; it is not legal and it opposes all laws and traditions," said Hassan Noui of the Independent High Authority for Election Monitoring (HIISE).
Election of women members of Parliament by adult universal suffrage is unconstitutional, Dickwitington Kimeze and Sisimuka Uganda, a non-governmental organization, claim in an April 18 petition filed at the Constitutional court. The petitioners want only women voting for women MPs and have attached the Electoral Commission and the attorney general as respondents. The petitioners say that section 8 (4) (II) of the Parliamentary Elections Act and the Local Governments Act in providing for the election of district women MPs and Local Government women councilors under universal adult suffrage are inconsistent with articles 78 (2), (3)& (4) and articles 180 (b), (c) and (d) of the Constitution.
The balance between the sexes in the Senate looks set to remain tilted in favour of men as only 23 women have asked to be nominated for election as senators at the next General Election. No woman was elected to the Senate in the last General Election, which resulted in the 18 who got there having to be picked from the lists of would-be nominees submitted to the electoral commission before the polls.
Three Ugandan health workers have made it to the final shortlist of the inaugural Women in Focus Awards that will take place in Geneva, Switzerland this week. The awards celebrate the crucial role played by women in the on-going fight against neglected tropical diseases, a role which often goes unrecognised and unrewarded.
Source: UN Women
Emmy Choge is a wife, a mother of four and an entrepreneur for the past five years. Emmy is the perfect epitome of a “super woman”.
Source: Human Rights Watch
The Angolan government must allow protesters to exercise their rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said today, ahead of a planned demonstration in Luanda for a woman’s right to have an abortion.
The fearless Gambian human rights activist won New African Woman magazine’s Woman of the Year Award at the their Award ceremony that took place in Dakar last night.
The Ministry of Gender Children Social Protection with funding from the World Bank has for the first time launched the Girls Ebola Recovery Livelihood Support or (GERLS) project in the country. The project will benefit 200 adolescent girls and young women in the three counties including Montserrado, Margibi, and Grand Bassa that are interested in improving and expanding their businesses.
Born in a small town of Mufulira, on the Copper Belt province of Zambia in 1960, Winnie Nachivula, is making a mark in the cassava production in Zambia which currently stands at over 1 million metric tonnes per year, making it the most important crop grown in Zambia after maize. Cassava is grown by 35 percent of the small-scale farmers in Zambia, contributing to 38% of Zambia's total human consumption requirements. It is a staple food for at least 30% of the population and a source of energy, proteins and vitamins A, B1, B2 and C.
Khadra Hussein Mohammad, 28, made history by becoming Somaliland’s first female National Deputy Prosecutor, dealing with a range of cases including theft, gang-related violence and terrorism.
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres designated children’s rights activist and Nobel Laureate Malala Yousafzai as a UN Messenger of Peace with a special focus on girls’ education.
The African Development Bank and the Mo Ibrahim Foundation have long had a close affinity and a natural alliance based on shared interests and complementary objectives. These qualities showed clearly at the 10th Mo Ibrahim Governance Weekend in Marrakech, Morocco, where the President spent a productive working weekend in the company of well-known personalities from African politics, commerce, investment and finance.
One of the aspects of the fight for gender equality in Africa that has been particularly frustrating for women activists is that much of this inequality is the continuing legacy of colonialism, which has altered the empowered role that African women once had in traditional African societies.
A group of women in colorful African dresses danced and sang songs familiar to everyone present. They were neither in Nairobi nor in Lagos. They were in the southern German city of Munich. But their cheers and laughter signaled a kind of happiness they hadn't experienced for a long time.
“I will never go back to the time when I feared attending my own business,” says Evah Kakobe, a long-time vendor at Mchikichini market in the city of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
For women working in the Mchikichini market, violence and discrimination was a daily reality, until recently. Betty Mtewele, a vendor there since 2005, describes the ordeal: “Women were verbally abused, sexually assaulted, their rights were not recognized by male traders, and in most cases, male traders would not settle their bills. Women did not know whom to approach, to address these violations and they lost hope.”
AFRICAN Union Commission (AUC) Special Envoy on Women, Peace and Security has appealed to Somalia government and the African Mission in Somali to engage women in all efforts to counter violent extremism.
It is followed by South Africa and Botswana at 17.4 percent and 16.9 percent respectively. Morocco and Cote D’Ivoire have the least number at 5.9 and 5.1 percent respectively.
IFC East Africa program Lead Stefan Handoyo credits the high number of Kenyan women board members to pro-women company policies, advanced education levels and fluency in English.