Source: Tanzania Daily News (Dar es Salaam)
THE plan to become a mother is often a positively fulfilling experience. However, many women suffer and even die as a result of motherhood.
Bogaletch Gebre knows exactly what women in her Ethiopian community are going through. Along with her sisters, the women’s rights activist was a victim of female genital mutilation (FGM) when she was a child in a part of Ethiopia where the practise was carried out on every girl.
Position paper calls for freedom from violence, equality in capabilities and resources, and women’s voice to be the cornerstones of a stand-alone gender equality goal.
Sometimes it does seem there’s a war over women’s bodies, and nowhere does this seem more dangerous than in the large number of regions where abortion is illegal, unsafe and life-threatening.
United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson today called on all partners – Governments, the private sector, civil society, the media, and ordinary citizens – to help fight human trafficking, stressing that ending this scourge requires action on all fronts.
Source: New Times
Chantal* begun her menstruation periods when she was in primary school. She remembers refusing to go to school for about five days.
Source: Africa Review
At the Itsali primary school, on a dusty road near Brazzaville's airport, all but one of the 20 teachers are women, a sign of the major gender shift in the Republic of Congo's educational system over the past two decades.
Source: Vanguard
Policemen attached to Adeniji Adele division have arrested a 22-year-old man who alleged kidnapped and raped a student of the University of Lagos, UNILAG, Akoka, for turning down his advances
Three postgraduate students at the American University of Cairo have created a campaign with public service announcements addressing domestic violence against women.
Source: Vanguard
More than 100 African business women converged in Lagos recently to lend their voices on the need for more women participation in politics, entrepreneurship and poverty alleviation as tools for nation building. The women who came from four African countries:Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda and South Africa advocated for women participation, especially in politics.
Source: Tanzania Daily News
A RECENT state report says that more than 3,000 poor children have been saved from the worst forms of labour and offered alternative means of earning a living. Some have been enrolled in vocational training institutions where they may acquire useful skills. This is delightful news but the story does not end here.
Seven-year-old Istar Mumin lies on a bed, motionless, in one of the rooms of her family home in Mogadishu’s Hamarweyne district. She has just gone through the horrifying ritual of “the cut,” which was carried out by a local Somali nurse.
UK Department for International Development (DFID) has approved 2 million Great Britain Pounds to promote and protect women’s rights.
The Female Lawyers Association-Gambia (FLAG) with support from Action Aid International The Gambia Saturday gathered stakeholders at a local hotel in Kololi for a day's seminar, designed at sensitising religious leaders and representatives of faith-based organisations on the critical issues in the draft Domestic Violence and Sexual Offences Bills.
Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's remarks at the Security Council thematic open debate "Addressing impunity: Effective justice for crimes of sexual violence in conflict", in New York on 24 June:
The Security Council today sent a strong signal to perpetrators of sexual violence in conflict that their crimes will not be tolerated, adopting a new resolution to strengthen efforts to end impunity for a scourge that affects not only large numbers of women and girls but also men and boys.
Source: IPS
When Maude Taruvinga* votes in Zimbabwe’s elections later this year, she will be voting for her local female politician as she has placed her hopes for a better future on the presence of more women in this southern African nation’s legislature.
Source: Daily Trust
Lagos — Nigerian pregnant women have been advised to inculcate the habit of taking Omega 3 DHA during pregnancy so as to develop their baby's vital sensory organs right from the womb.
Source: Voice of America (Washington, DC)
A combination of strategies aimed at improving the quality of care for mothers in rural Malawi has dramatically reduced newborn mortality. Experts say it could be a model for similar programs in other countries with poor pre- and post-natal care.
Source: Georges W. Bush Institute
In less than two weeks, Heads of State, current and former First Ladies, government officials, academics, and representatives from non-profit and private sector organizations around the world will gather at the George W. Bush Institute’s African First Ladies Summit, “Investing in Women: Strengthening Africa” in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, to focus on effective investments in women that lead to greater stability and prosperity in countries.