• SHARE:

Botswana

Chigedze Virginia Chinyepi is the Alliance focal person for Botswana. She has served as a SADC Gender and Development Protocol Alliance member from 2009 to date, advocating for the implementation of the Protocol. Chigedze chairs the Gender sector of BOCONGO. She has more than two decades of working in the private sector and civil society organisations (CSOs) in Southern Africa, specifically in Botswana and South Africa, a decade of which was spent in advocating and lobbying governments, under the Non- Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and umbrella networks for empowerment of women in mainstreaming of Gender and Development programmes.

She is a seasoned businesswoman and a Chair of Business Botswana Sector Level Committee for the Ministry of Nationality, Immigration and Gender Affairs, which she represents at the High Level Consultative Committee, chaired by the President of Botswana. She was appointed by the Minister of Nationality, Immigration and Gender Affairs to serve as a member of the Board of the NGO Council and the newly established Botswana National Gender Commission, as a Gender Commissioner from 2016 to 2019. She is also member of the Global Environmental Facility (GEF) of the United Nations Development Agency (UNDP) Small Grant Program (SGP) since 2013 to date.

Chigedze is the Gender focal person of the Southern African Partnerships for the Prevention of Conflict (SAPPC) which is a network of the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict {GPPAC}

 

Gender and Governance

Vision

Gender Links is committed to a region in which women and men and LGBTI persons are able to participate equally in all aspects of public and private life in accordance with the provisions of the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development.

Mission

GL achieves its vision through a people-centred approach that includes coordinating the work of the Southern African Gender Protocol Alliance formed around the sub-regional instrument that brings together all key African and global commitments for achieving gender equality by 2015, also the target date for MDG 3 (gender equality). The Protocol is being reviewed and aligned to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); the Beijing Plus Twenty review and African Agenda 2063. The annual Barometer measures progress made by governments against the 28 targets of the Protocol. GL has integrated these targets into its three core, closely linked programme areas: the media, governance and gender justice, and its cross cutting programmes: climate change, economic justice and LGBTI issues.

Working with partners at local, national, regional and international level, GL aims to:

  • Promote gender equality in and through the media, and in all areas of governance.
  • Develop policies and conduct effective campaigns for ending gender violence, HIV and AIDS, as well as promoting economic and climate justice and LGBTI rights.
  • Build the capacity of women and men to engage critically in democratic processes that advance equality and justice.

This mission is achieved through a strong commitment to results that includes:

  • Evidence gathered through conducting research to identify gender gaps.
  • Lobbying and advocacy using mainstream and new media.
  • Developing action plans in participative ways that bring together a broad cross section of partners in learning that is applied and supported on-the-job.
  • Creating synergies to sustain the work.
  • Monitoring and evaluating progress using appropriate regional and international instruments.
  • Learning, knowledge creation and innovation.
  • Ensuring value for money – economy, efficiency and effectiveness – in all GL’s undertakings.
  • Fund raising at country and regional level, including maintaining a diverse portfolio of funders and income generating activities through the GL Cottages and GL Services.
  • A commitment to institutional effectiveness that includes staff growth and development; efficient and effective use of IT, the purchase and maintenance of physical assets that create an enabling environment for work and wellness.

Click here for Gender Links' Vision 2020.