Source: Zambia Daily Mail Education is very important for every child whether boy or girl. It is, therefore, sad that some communities still discriminate against the education of the girl-child.
Source: SpyGhana
A research finding from a study of girls’ sexual relations outcomes in Accra suggest that the Ghana’s Reproductive Policy adopted in 2000 may not be sufficient in addressing the reproductive health of young girls.
Source: Huffington Post
The Obama administration is pushing for greater U.S. investment in Africa. But the great African summit, held in Washington recently, was largely theater; necessary and important, but still a work of fiction.
If you knew nothing about the subject, you might think that U.S. business, in an extraordinary historical oversight, has overlooked opportunity-rich Africa. Actually, America's trade with Africa has been in free fall since 2008. China's trade with Africa is reaching new heights every year, including this one. It more than doubles ours now.
For a decade, Africa -- nearly all of its 54 countries -- has looked east, and China has seized the opening. Yet the Chinese presence in Africa hasn't helped its underlying problems. Instead, it has put money in the pockets of the ruling elites and has turned a blind eye to the excesses of those elites.
China's interest in Africa, brilliantly and cynically exploited, has been in raw materials. A theme at last week's Washington summit was that there was something wrong with exploiting raw materials, and that value-added manufacturing -- which creates real wealth and real jobs -- could just be wished into being with more investment dollars.
China has flooded the continent with its lowest-quality exports - goods that wouldn't make it onto the shelves of Walmart -- and has even cheated the Africans out of the best jobs that its raw materials-hungry policy has created by bringing in Chinese workers.
The Africans get even less out of the Chinese colonization, by another name, than it did out of the European version in the "scramble for Africa" in the last decades of the 19th century. But the elites are allowed a free hand with their kleptocracy, their human rights violations and their indifference to the condition of their own people. This sets up an asymmetrical competition with Western laws against bribery, fair trade practices and the fact that American and international companies cannot be directed to serve a political purpose by their home governments.
President Obama made a good, even a great start, before the summit when he called for an end to the bad old ways of Africa. But his words were not echoed by the delegates.
The long-term future of Africa lies in fundamental reforms within its social and political structures -- and one in particular: its attitude toward women. If you spend any time there, two things are apparent: women have a raw deal, yet they -- not the oil or the chrome or the copper, but the used and abused women of Africa -- are its future.
Women hold Africa together and suffer in silence. They are the ones bent over with primitive implements in the fields, inevitably with their latest infant strapped to their backs. They are the ones who must endure marriage during puberty, bear children before their bodies are fully formed and face the world's highest rates of death during childbirth.
In shiny office buildings in Accra or Lusaka, it is the women who are moving the work forward. If you need something done, from a permit to an airline reservation, seek out a woman in an office. However, very few women make it to those prized jobs.
On the farms in Africa, it is the women who have managed small cooperatives, mastered micro-credit and provide family life. But they still must bend over their budzas with their youngest child strapped to their backs. The budza is a kind of hoe used for weeding, tilling and sowing. In its way, it is also a symbol of female enslavement; light enough for a woman to use all day long.
The women of Africa need to be told often and in every way they are special. They need to know that they have value beyond sex and work; that they are not an inferior gender, that they are the future.
The summit touched, in passing, on the talent and the plight women, as the male leaders talked the talk of international good intentions. But the women of Africa need recognition. Give them the tools of education and opportunity and they will do the job.
The budza needs to be retired, as does the culture of female enslavement of which it is the symbol.
Source: Institute for Inclusive Security
Although quotas can be a powerful tool for elevating more women to political office, they can also function as a glass ceiling, with representation typically not surpassing the number that is required by law. Quotas also don’t necessarily equal substantive and meaningful participation. So how do we move beyond mere numbers?
Source: The Economist
ZEINABOU Moussa is but a girl, flat-chested, soft-skinned and shy. Yet at just 16 she has seen more of marriage than she would like. Earlier this year, having been beaten and bullied into wedding a stranger, she took a stand.
Source: On Islam
Rural Muslim communities in Malawi have intensified efforts to reduce rising cases of early marriages among girls to champion the promotion of the education for the girl child, which is said to have suffered much neglect.
Source: Swazi Observer
Despite the promising rapid economic growth in Swaziland, gender disparities in women’s economic participation have remained deep and persistent in the country.
Source: The Guardian
Esther Worae believes a key part of her job is to preach the message of contraception. Along with her team from the Marie Stopes clinic in Accra, she goes to places that attract a crowd – the beach, the marketplace – to talk to people about the value of family planning, the dangers of early marriage and the importance of women having access to all of the healthcare services they may need to prevent them dying from pregnancy or childbirth.
Source: VC4Africa
I think its time discussions and debates on whether there are few women in tech and their low participation in the tech hubs, or whether we should be developing more female based tech hubs across Africa should take a different direction.
Source: KC Team
Every year, more than 3,000 young girls are raped in Zimbabwe - often by members of their own families. With the number of cases increasing, Zimbabwe's government has launched a national campaign to tackle the issue, which is causing great trauma and new HIV infections.
Source: Daily News
The National Council for Women (NCW) called upon Al-Azhar to reconsider its educational curricula and institutes related to women to fit their prestige and value in Egyptian society.
Source: SA news
On 17 April 1954 the women of South Africa made their voices heard through the Women's Charter which strived for the removal of all laws, regulations, conventions and customs that discriminate against them.
Source: The Art Newspaper
Although sexual harassment has recently been made a crime in the country, incidents of assault are on the rise
Source: Daily Independent via AllAfrica
The Coordinator, Women in the New Nigeria and Youth Initiative (WINN), a Non Governmental Organization (NGO) in Borno state, Ambassador Lucy Yunana has said that the increasing cases of rape and other violence against women and girls were attributed to lack of victims and witnesses reporting the matter to relevant authorities for appropriate action.
Source: IRIN
The kidnapping of more than 200 girls from a secondary school in Chibok in northeastern Nigeria's Borno State in April by Boko Haram militants, and a so far unsuccessful high-profile campaign to free them, exemplifies the insecurity-driven education crisis in the area.
Source: Al Monitor
Leila, 22, returned to the kitchen after a few days of rest from house chores. She had university exams. The Sanaa University student laughed when asked, "Where do Yemeni girls spend their summer?" She said, "You are in Yemen!"
Source: CapitalFM
Naima Nguruki and Jacqueline Shongo are about 10 years old but at such a tender age, the brutality of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) and forced early marriage have separated them from their families.
Source: Voice of America Incidents of violence against women continue to dominate media headlines in Malawi, despite an eight-year-old law that has stiffened penalties. Police officials say they handle such cases on a daily basis. Advocates blame causes ranging from lenient court sentences to cultural practices.
Source: New Zimbabwe Human rights organisations have lambasted SADC countries for failing to address rights violations in member states.
Source: CNBC Africa Passing through Johannesburg on her way back, she spoke to Methil Renuka, Editor of Forbes Woman Africa, about the decisions she had to take in Malawi's much-disputed May elections, and also her intention to continue her work championing women's rights once she returns home.