21 February 2017 – Almost 1.4 million children are at imminent risk of death due to severe acute malnutrition this year, as famine threatens in Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen, warned the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), urging prompt action to save them.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has launched a new initiative to support and empower rural women across the country.
The organisation last week launched the second phase of Rural Women Economic Empowerment (RWEE) project to help accelerate economic empowerment for women.
Source: The Guardian
Life of forced prostitution awaits majority of the 11,009 Nigerian women who arrived on Italy's shores last year, says International Organisation for Migration.
Source: IntLawGrrls
In a decision that can be interpreted a historic milestone and a ‘triple high-five’ for the promotion of accountability for women’s human rights in Africa; for the recognition of violence against women as a violation of human rights, and for the emerging role of African regional courts in addressing human rights issues, on the 24th of January, 2017, the ECOWAS Court (the ECCJ or the Court) ruled that it has the competence to hear a case of domestic violence instituted against the Federal Government of Nigeria by two NGOs. I review that decision in this post.
Source: The Monitor
There was mixed reactions as members of the10thparliament deliberated on how to re-table the Marriage and Divorce Bill that has spent more than a decade on the floor of parliament.
Source: The Citizen
A five-year plan has been adopted by Plan International organization to prevent over 12,000 young girls in four regions in Tanzania from child marriage.
Source: allAfrica
Domestic violence cases increased by 20 percent last year in Harare as compared to 2015, as police officers have been urged to continue sharpening their crime prevention strategies in order to safeguard life and property and reduce fear of crime in the province.
Source: Egyptian Streets
The gender pay gap is not an issue that is limited to the Arab World; it has its share of debates worldwide, even in Hollywood.
Malawi First Lady Madam Gertrude Mutharika has urged Malawian women to periodically go for cancer screening to save their lives.
“It is like a fish pond. All the women are fishes and the men are sprinkling food. If they start to sprinkle food, all the fish will come up to them.”
I am with women and men who, forced to flee their homes due to the conflict with Boko Haram, have made their way to camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Maiduguri in Borno State in North-East Nigeria. We are talking about what is happening in the camps when one of the women makes this analogy.
Source: UNFPA
Traditional leaders hold incredible power to realize young people’s sexual and reproductive health rights. Yet, many traditional communities in rural Swaziland have resisted public discussion of ‘taboo’ topics such as sexual-and gender-based violence and the HIV epidemic, especially regarding young people.
Source: Plan International
Malawi has made a historic amendment to its constitution to fully outlaw child marriage following a year-long campaign by youth groups and organisations including Plan International.
Source: AllAfrica
President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's presence has not translated into women rising from the grassroots to be equally represented in decision-making forums in the country, writes Muneinazvo Kujeke, a researcher at the Institute for Security Studies.
(Dar es Salaam) – More than 40 percent of Tanzania’s adolescents are left out of quality lower-secondary education despite the government’s positive decision to make lower-secondary education free.
Children and women are being raped by traffickers inside a refugee camp in northern France, according to detailed testimony gathered ahead of fresh legal action against the UK government’s approach to the welfare of unaccompanied minors.
A lot has been said about Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohammed’s failed candidature for chairperson of the African Union Commission.
The loss is disappointing, but the lessons learnt are invaluable. Her candidature was strong — so strong that she survived to the final round where political and regional gerrymandering took over.
A health network is being created, with support of United Nations agencies, in nine countries – Bangladesh, Cote d'Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, India, Malawi, Nigeria, Tanzania and Uganda – whose Governments have pledged to halve maternal and newborn deaths in health facilities by 2022.
A new partnership focused on reforming gender-discriminatory laws was unveiled at an event co-hosted by UN Women, the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and Equality Now, in New York. The “Roadmap for Substantive Equality: 2030” aims at repealing or amending laws that discriminate against women and girls, and ensuring that laws are grounded in gender equality and women’s human rights, and fully implemented, as part of global efforts to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Bill and Melinda Gates have released their annual letter, and this time it is addressed to their "dear friend" Warren Buffett, who donated most of his fortune to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in order to fight disease and reduce inequity.
Source: AllAfrica
Graça Machel has called for an end to impunity for violations of the rights of women living with HIV, such as forced sterilisation. The former first lady of Mozambique and South Africa was chairing a debate at the International AIDS Conference in Durban last week.