Roadmap to Equality, Issue 8, February 2010

Table of contents

Editor’s note

Highlights

Southern Africa caucus on Beijing Plus Fifteen review held

Southern African Gender Protocol Alliance draws up a Beijing +15 position paper

Key events to look out for at CSW

Global: African women to be linked to CSW through global cyber dialogues

Regional: Gender Justice and Local Government Summit to be held 22-24 March 2010

Gender-based Violence

Africa: UNiTE to End Violence against Women and Girls campaign launched

Africa:2010 FIFA world cup boosts Continent’s Human Trafiking

South Africa: ‘Man Up’ Campaign to Mobilize Youth Against Gender Violence.

Constitutional and Legal Rights

Africa: Crackdown on Gays Make the Closet Safer

Zambia: Police Breaking the Law to Prevent Crime

Kenya: 4-Year-Old Bride for Price of Beaded Necklace

Kill the Gays or Kill the Bill?

Governance and Peace Building

Zambia: Scarcely Room for Women in Male-Dominated Politics

Mozambique: First Women Speaker a Step of Equality

Kenya: Women Urged to be Agents of Peace,Reconciliation

Economic Justice, Education and Training

Gender Budgeting: Zimbabwe case study

South Africa:Women Must make Inroads in Construction

Health, HIV and AIDS

Zambia: Here’s How to Sustain HIV/AIDS Workplace policies

South Africa: The President and HIV prevention

Media, Information and Communications

Global: Join online discussion on Women and Media, Section J of Beijing Platform for Action

Integrated Approaches/ Monitoring and Eval- uation

Regional: Roll out of pilot study to develop indicators to measure GBV set to begin in earnest

Botswana National Action Plan to End Gender Based Violence under review

Gender Resources

• Roadmap to equality Handbook
• Barometer Baseline Research
• Pamphlets in indigenous languages
• English and French DVD’s
• Barometer Country reports

Gender Evangelist

Grace Chiumia, Member of Parliament from Malawi, Northern Province.

In a race to win elections in her constituency in Nkhatabay West, northern Malawi, Grace Chiumia coined herself ‘Obama’. Yes she can, and she did.

Chiumia is the first woman, member of parliament to be in her constituency. Chiumia took the role of an MP seriously and as the first and only woman who ran for the post against eight other men she did it.

She is the second deputy chair person for the health and population committee in Malawi. She has found her grounding and in her first months in her position as an MP, she has found that there is need to have a voice for the women and children in communities that are most vulnerable to HIV and AIDS.
These include children who are heading house holds in most communities of Malawi. Families in Malawi are slowly come to terms with the understanding of stigma and discrimination towards people living with HIV and AIDS (PLWHA).

Chiumia attended the VSO-RAISA MP training in Pretoria to assist members of parliament to be more articulate on the issues pertaining to HIV and AIDS policy implementation in the context of care work.Read more about her.

Source:www.gemsa.org.za

Country Highlights

Editor’s note

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Highlights

As the globe focuses on the Beijing Platform For Action fifteen year review it must be applauded that Southern Africa has made some strides, however small, towards achieving gender equality. This was noted by civil society members and government representatives with support from development partners including UNIFEM at a sub-regional pre-Beijing Plus Fifteen caucus held 4-6 February 2010 in Johannesburg and convened by Gender Links and GEMSA.

The meeting brought together 39 (34 females and 5 males) participants comprising the Southern Africa Gender Protocol Alliance members, government representatives, FEMNET and other strategic partners to establish a regional position on progress made by SADC States ahead of the Beijing Platform for Action (BPFA) fifteen year review. The review will take place at the 54th Session of the United Nations Commission on the Status Women (CSW) in March this year.

The meeting provided an opportunity to get feedback on Southern Africa’s input to and outcomes of the Africa Women’s NGO Consultative Meeting held in the margins of the Eighth Africa Regional Conference on Women (focused on Beijing+15) in Banjul, The Gambia. The Africa NGO report was circulated and commented upon at the meeting. Participants also planned for global citizen participation in CSW through cyber dialogues and how the region can be represented at other parallel events.

The SADC Gender Unit was represented and paid tribute to the work by Gender NGOs in assisting governments and other role players in working towards gender equality particularly in the region. FEMNET participated in its capacity as coordinator of the drafting of the Africa Beijing Plus Fifteen NGO shadow report and Africa caucus at the CSW.

At the caucus it was acknowledged that in order to work around some of the areas that the region still battles it was imperative to work together. Three key regional campaigns were identified that civil society working with government could rally around. For example, the 50/50 women in decision making; Making Care Work Count and Red Light 2010 (with a focus on getting anti-human trafficking legislation in place in all SADC countries by 2015). Malawi in particular demonstrates a best practice where civil society has partnered effectively with government with support from development partners in a 50/50 campaign and the dividends are paying off.

Click here for full report

Southern Africa Gender Protocol Alliance draws up a Beijing Plus 15 position paper

The Southern Africa Protocol Alliance prepared a position paper for the 54th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women which will focus on Beijing Platform for Action fifteenth review. It is a snapshot of civil society’s view of SADC member states progress in meeting the BPFA strategic objectives and actions committed therein.

This is largely drawn for the SADC Gender Protocol Baseline Barometer, an Alliance annual publication that tracks progress of SADC member states in meeting targets set in the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development. The thematic areas covered are similar to what constitutes the BPFA critical areas of concern. It also includes a citizen’s score card on the thematic areas of the SADC Protocol. Because the Protocol is a sub-regional one stop shop that brings together key commitments of sub-regional, regional and international instruments that relate to gender and development the findings can be used as indicators of progress on BPFA.

SADC has scored a global first by adopting a SADC Protocol on Gender and Development which encompasses main provisions of gender related regional and international instruments. The Gender Protocol has 28 targets and timelines for achieving these. This shows that there is political will though more needs to be done especially in terms of allocating the required resources when drawing up national budgets to ensure that these commitments are fulfilled.

There are areas which are showing signs of progress such as education and women in political decision making. While most of the countries are nowhere near the 50% target of women in decision making as called for by BPFA, the SADC Gender Protocol , Africa Union Protocol on Women’s Rights and other instruments there are some gains in some areas of decision making. For example in parliament (combined houses): Angola has moved up by 23.6% from 15 to 38.6%; South Africa by 10.1% from 32.6 to 42.7%; Malawi by 8.2% from 13 to 21.2% and Mozambique by 3.6% from 34.8 to 38.4% and first women speaker in parliament. The meeting emphasised however that these gains need to be guarded because there has been slippages such as Botswana which has moved down by 3,2% from 11,1 to 7,9%.

However in other sectors such as private sector, media and government bureaucratic structures women are still at the bottom.

Significant progress has been made in the education sector as almost all countries have reached gender parity in primary and secondary education. Gender based violence is high on national agendas as many of the countries now have some form of year long multi-sector action plans to end gender violence. At least nine countries have legislation on domestic violence, seven on specific sexual offences legislation.

Civil society does recognise the progress to the extent that in a citizen scorecard governments were rated to have achieved 55% towards implementing the Gender Protocol in the SADC Gender Protocol Barometer Baseline Barometer.

Nonetheless, there are many gaps: traditional harmful customary practices remain; women still bear the burden of unpaid care work for those with HIV and AIDS, the aged and orphans, without much assistance from governments (except in Botswana); basic services are inadequate; gender stereotypes in media remain among other findings in the Baseline Barometer.

As we go to the CSW these are some of the issues that will feature in the Southern Africa civil society position paper. It will be interesting to note what the SADC governments have to say if there is going to be a Beijing Plus Fifteen official report. View Southern Africa position paper and send comments to: alliance@genderlinks.org.za Click here to get the position paper

KEY EVENTS TO LOOK OUT FOR AT CSW54

Gender Links, Gender and Media Southern Africa (GEMSA) with support from Unifem will hold cyber dialogues , online chats anchored on the GL website parallel to the 54th session on the Commission on the Status of Women. The main aim of the cyber dialogues is to ensure global interaction with the news coming out of New York for those not attending the CSW . This is especially targeted at getting African women’s voices heard from the Global South who are often marginalised because of lack of resources to travel and access to information. This will happen under the banner “Making IT work for gender justice”

Outcomes of the cyber dialogues will feature in a Daily Newspaper, Daily Links, to be produced by Gender Links and its partner the AfricaWomen Feature Service (AWC) and distributed at CSW and on the Gender Links website. <!-[if !vml]->

Time: The cyber discussions would run from 9 am to 10 am each day New York time. The online discussion will immediately be followed by a face to face discussion from 10-11 am in New York and the other centres.

Location: Anyone around the world with a laptop or Internet connction can join the cyber ialogues. But these will also have anchor points at locationsin in ten Southern African countries and global partners.

Format:

• The first 15-20 minutes will review the news of the day. This would be facilitated by different members of the editorial team who covered particular stories.
• The latter 40 minutes would focus on the theme for the day, with two to three conference participants who are experts in that particular field (including one African expert on each day) available at the “hubÀ.
• The discussion would be structured according to four questions on the theme determined in advance by the partner organizations in this venture.

Facilitation:

• One overall facilitator would ensure adherence to time and basic online discussion protocols.
• The overall facilitator would summarise and post the discussions each day.

Language:
The discussions will be held in English, French and Spanish. However, we will explore with partners how to ensure participation, access and understanding on the ground through local facilitators.

Click here for more information

Venue: If you are in New York join the face to face discussions in the Boardroom of the Ford Foundation, 320 East 43rd Street, New York, N.Y. 10017 USA

In Southern Africa the dialogues will be anchored in country if you want to participate in a face to face discussion please get in touch with the following and make arrangements to be there:
Country

/Contact Person/ Contact number/ E-mail

Botswana, Keabanye Ntsabane, coordbotswana@genderlinks.org.za
DRC, Dorothee Swedi, 243999913746, dorothee_swedi@yahoo.fr
Lesotho, Sophia Thali, 26658920793, sophia.tlali@yahoo.com
Malawi, Emma Kaliya, 265888825376, ekaliya@humanrights.mw
Mauritius, Gareth White 2304669873 davidwhite17@hotmail.com
mozambique, Clementina Comate, 258823808950, gemsamoz@gemsanet.org
Namibia, Sarry Xoagus-Eises, 2646128825921, sxoaguseises@yahoo.com
South Africa, Seanna Chingamuka 27116222877, gmdc@genderlinks.org.za
Swaziland, Ncane Maziya, 2686240486, smegwa2003@yahoo.com
Zambia, Perpetual Sichinkwenkwe, 260211264132, persichi@gmail.com
Zimbabwe, Magaret Zunguze, 263912363429, margaret@ekowisa.org.za

Click here for member states reports on Beijing Plus Fifteen

Click here for regiona blocks BPFA progress reports

2010 NGO Global Forum for Women: Beijing +15
Dates: Sat, Feb 27, 2010 to: Thu, Jan 28, 2010

2010 marks the 15th anniversary of the Beijing World Conference on Women. In recognition of this anniversary, the NGO Committee on the Status of Women, NY is organizing an NGO Global Women’s Forum from February 27 to 28 2010 to consider implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (BPfA). The Forum program will include two full conference days commencing with an opening ceremony, and continuing with plenary sessions, panel discussions, and workshops. The NGO CSW is the principal locus of NGO facilitation and coordination for the Forum and is working closely with NGOs and UN partners to assure full and representative participation from all regions of the world, especially from developing countries. For regular updates click here

To get a full list of parallel events of CSW54 from the NGO Global Forum for Women click here

Launch of the Africa Women’s Regional Shadow Report on Beijing +15 in the margins of the 54th Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women.
Keynote Speaker: Hon. Gertrude Mongella
Date: March 1st, 2010
Time: 2:00 to 4:00PM
Venue: 8th Floor, Church Centre for the United Nation, 777 UN Plaza (corner of 44th Street and 1st Avenue), New York

Title Showcasing of the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development as a good practice
During Session Two of the African Women’s caucus with the theme African Voices: How Implementing the Beijing Platform for Action is Impacting Women’s Lives. The drafting of the African Women’s Oral Statement to the CSW led by Mama Koite of FEMNET will take place in this session.
Date: March 3, 2010
Venue: 8th floor of the UN Church Centre, 777 UN Plaza (corner of 44th Street and 1st Avenue), New York

Gender Equality Architecture Reform at the UN organised by GEAR Campaign Working Group
Date: 1st March
Time: 4:00 À“ 5:30pm
Venue: Church Center, 10th Floor,

Physical and online sale of Gender Links publications
If you want to pay cash or pay online and get your books instantly while in New York please visit
Click here for an online catalogue

Daily Newspaper, Daily Links will be produced and circulated each morning from 2nd À“ 8th March at CSW. You can also view the paper online on:
https://www.genderlinks.org.za/page/csw-bejing-15

Updates from Beijing Plus 15
Please visit: https://www.genderlinks.org.za/page/beijing-15

Regional: Gender Justice and Local Government Summit to be held 22-24 March 2010

Gender Links (GL) will be holding the first Local Government and Gender Justice Summit from 22 – 24 March 2010 in Johannesburg, South Africa. The deadline for submission of best practices has been extended to 22 February 2010.

Under the banner “365 Days of local action to end gender violence” the summit will include key note addresses and parallel seminars by international and local experts in the field of gender violence at local government level, and gender justice.

The first local government and gender justice summit aims to bring together local government councillors and officials, relevant government ministries and NGOs that work with local government from the region. The summit will feature awards on good practices in ending gender violence, provide an opportunity to document and disseminate these good practices as well as give incentives to local authorities to innovate new and effective strategies for combating violence against women. Parallel seminars on promoting women’s representation and effective participation in local government structures will be a key feature at the summit. Read more

Click here for call for good practices

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Gender-based violence

Africa: UNiTE to End Violence against Women and Girls campaign launched.

Africa-UNiTE to End Violence against Women and Girls, the Africa component of the UN Secretary-General’s global campaign, was launched on 30 January in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The event was attended by representatives from Member States of the African Union, the United Nations system and civil society.

As outlined in a presentation by Micheline Ravololonarisoa, Chief of UNIFEM’s Africa Section, the campaign aims to mobilize UN Member States, civil society, the private sector, the UN system, as well as individual men, women and youth, to join forces to turn existing commitments to end violence against women into a reality by 2015, the deadline for achieving the Millennium Development Goals.

In a message from UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, delivered by the UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of the UN Economic Commission for Africa, Abdoulie Janneh, he emphasized the need for taking concrete steps to end impunity for violence against women and girls. He called on African leaders to listen to the voices of survivors of such violence and to show strong political leadership in their response. The Secretary-General made reference to his recent launch of the Network of Men Leaders and stated his strong belief that men must teach each other that real men do not violate or oppress women À“ and that a woman’s place is not just in the home or the field, but in schools and offices and boardrooms.

“We know African women are often a linchpin keeping families, communities, and nations together,” Mr. Ban said .

African women are the “driving force to overcome poverty, reduce hunger, fight illiteracy, heal the sick, prevent the spread of disease and promote stability,” he said in a message read on his behalf by Cheick Sidi Diarra, UN High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States. Read more

Source: UN News services.

By Issa Sikiti Da Silva

“This is an African World Cup and every African must somehow benefit from it,” a human trafficker told Bizcommunity.com this week, requesting ‘absolute’ anonymity.

Since 2004, the year SA was chosen to organise the World Cup, human trafficking ‘offices’ have been opened at various African countries, where unscrupulous people working as ‘agents’ register desperate people dying to get to the ‘final destination’ (SA) to seek any form of employment or business opportunities.

“Our agents coordinate our clients’ travel arrangements and send them to a certain point, where I go fetch them and bring them into SA from Beit Bridge.

“With no passports, no visa or any form of paper, their entry is guaranteed by our connections and it is easy as long as you can speak the correct language,” the source said, referring to bribes.

The source said business has been booming since 2004, adding every month they bring at least 50, 70 and sometimes 100 people, which makes it close to 1200 people each year, at a price ranging from US$2000 (about R15 000) to US$6000 (about R44 500), depending on the country of departure.

Read more

Source: AllAfrica.com

By Henoch Derbew

Often overlooked, gender inequity is a prevalent global reality, directly affecting females across virtually every demographic. It exists in various forms, from systematic exclusion from social leadership, politics, and business to using rape as a terrorizing weapon in conflicts.

To stop this, especially the violence against women, the New York-based “Man Up” campaign seeks to organize youth around the world to initiate concrete change at the community level.

“Man Up’s” Co-Founder and Executive Director, Jimmie Briggs – a writer, teacher, journalist, and advocate – has worked for several key organizations pushing for equal rights for women, including Amnesty International, the United Nations, and Oxfam. He has also written articles published in LIFE and The Washington Post, as well as books on child soldiers living in some of the most dangerous conflict zones, such as the Democratic Republic of Congo. He is currently preparing to publish another book this year entitled “The Wars Women Fight.” Read more

AllAfrica.com

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Consitutional and legal rights

More than two-thirds of African countries have laws criminalizing homosexual acts, and despite accounting for a significant percentage of new infections in many countries, men who have sex with men tend to be left out of the HIV response.

NAIROBI, 19 January 2010 (PlusNews) – More than two-thirds of African countries have laws criminalizing homosexual acts, and despite accounting for a significant percentage of new infections in many countries, men who have sex with men tend to be left out of the HIV response.

“[They] are going underground; they are hiding themselves and continuing to fuel the epidemic,” UNAIDS executive director Michél Sidibé told IRIN/PlusNews recently. “We need to make sure these vulnerable groups have the same rights everyone enjoys: access to information, care and prevention for them and their families.”

IRIN/PlusNews has compiled a short list of human rights violations against gay Africans: Read more

Source: IRIN PlusNews

Zambia: Police Breaking the Law to Prevent Crime

Juniper Mwale was attending a funeral in another town when her husband jumped bail and fled the country. Despite not being aware of her husband’s escape, police tracked her down and detained her illegally in an effort to force her spouse home.

Detaining someone without cause is against the law in Zambia. But the country’s police continue to do this, specifically targeting the female relatives of a suspect, in an attempt to gather information or force the suspect out into the open. Read more

Source : IPS

By Hassan Huka and Muchiri Karanja

In a remote part of Samburu, four-year-olds are neither attending school nor have they an inkling of video and computer games that their urban counterparts take so much for granted.

In the villages of Kipsing location, Ol Donyiro Division, 100 kilometres from Isiolo Town, four-year-old Itoms is on the run; first from her own parents, who want her circumcised before marrying her off for 10 cattle, and from Samburu morans (Maasai warriors), who for a beaded necklace called saen, are free to have sex with a girl barely out of her diapers.Itoms turns five this year. Yet, according to Samburu tradition, she is old enough to fetch bride-price for her father and become a wife to a man seven times her age. She had already been booked for sex and eventual marriage to a 27-year-old Moran, in a common ritual called Aisho saen (wearing a necklace).

But a local child rights activist got wind of it thanks to local assistant chief, Henry Lesokoyo, and whisked her away from home. Little Itoms has no idea what the man who “booked” her looks like, and is crying to go back home. Read more

Daily Nation online

Kill the Gays or Kill the Bill?

On behalf of and as a member of the Civil Society Coalition on Human Rights & Constitutional Law, the Refugee Law Project has released the Coalition’s recent compilation of articles, opinions and press statements related to the Anti-Homosexuality Bill currently before Uganda’s Parliament.

As many of you will be aware, the Bill poses a substantial threat to human rights in Uganda, both the rights of same-sex attracted and trans-gendered people and of anybody who fails to report them and the rights of those who seek to work in a supportive manner. Whether it be in terms of protecting LGBTI rights, working on HIV/AIDS prevention, providing counselling, or simply providing information on sex and sexuality, civil society organisations, academics and health workers are all under threat should this bill be passed. Some of the Refugee Law Project’s refugee and asylum seeker clients will be placed at further risk if the Bill passes, and the day-to-day work of providing legal aid and counselling will also be substantially jeopardised.
Read more

Source: Women’sNet

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