Category: News

PRESS RELEASE

 

For Immediate Release

Accra, 7^th April 2012

The African Women’s Development Fund congratulates Joyce Banda, President of Malawi

 

The African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) extends our congratulations to Her Excellency Joyce Banda, who has recently been sworn into office as President of Malawi.

 

Joyce Banda has been a longtime advocate for women’s rights and through her leadership of the ‘Joyce Banda Foundation’ (an AWDF grantee partner) she has supported civic education and empowerment activities for community based women. A member of the African Womens Leadership Network for Reproductive Health and Family Planning, in November 2010, AWDF awarded Joyce Banda a ‘Woman of Substance’ award in the ‘Special Recognition Category’.

 

Theo Sowa, Interim CEO of AWDF states, “Our condolences go to the family of the late President Bingu wa Mutharika. Despite the tragic circumstances of her appointment, I am certain that President Joyce Banda will guide the people of Malawi with the same vision, principled leadership and diligence that she has shown in her life and work to date. Her track record as a women’s rights activist, and her history of working with community-based organisations is commendable. In November 2010, AWDF was privileged to have Joyce Banda participate in our 10^th anniversary celebrations, where she spoke on the topic, “Quality versus quantity: How far have we come in promoting African women’s participation in politics?” This panel discussion now seems prescient, and we look forward to Joyce Banda distinguishing herself as an inspiring African woman president.

 

ENDS

About the African Women’s Development Fund

Over the past ten years, the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) has blazed a trail for women’s rights and philanthropy across the African continent. AWDF is an African, not for profit, grantmaking organisation. Since the start of operations in 2001, AWDF has provided US$19 million in grants to 800 women’s organisations in 42 African countries.

AWDF’s grant making processes are uniquely designed to meet the needs of African women and activities include the provision of small and larger grants to African women’s organisations, capacity building support and a strong focus on advocacy and movement building.

Press Enquiries

 

Nana Darkoa Sekyiamah (AWDF Programme Officer for Communications)

Tel: +233 302 521 257 (Ghana)

Email: nana@africlub.net/awdf

Website: www.africlub.net/awdf

On Thursday 5th April 2012, Theo Sowa, AWDF’s Interim CEO spoke on the critical importance of ‘African Women’s Voice and Representation’, at a TEDxChange in Berlin. Germany. To watch a video of her speech please click here

Theo Sowa spoke alongside Melinda French Gates, Sven Giegold and Baaba Maal. For full details of the TEDxChange event please visit their website

 

Nneka Egbuna, AWDF’s Ambassador for the Arts has been featured in the April/May edition of New African Woman (English edition).

This article focuses on Nneka’s working visit to the African Women’s Development Fund in Ghana to officially start her role as the foundation’s Ambassador for the Arts. Nneka arrived in Ghana on the 12^th of February 2012 immediately after finishing her Africa tour, which had taken her to Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Zanzibar.

New African Woman is widely distributed throughout Africa and the rest of the world. For details of where to purchase a copy or for digital access please visit http://www.africasia.com/newafricanwoman/

 

The staff of the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) congratulates Dr Hilda Tadria on being recognised by ‘New Vision’, a leading Ugandan daily, as a woman who has made a positive mark on Ugandan society. At AWDF we are intimately aware of the hard work, passion and commitment which Dr Tadria brings to women rights work, especially in the areas of mentoring, leadership and inter generational dialogue. For this reason we are especially pleased to see Dr Tadria being recognised in her own home country.

We also extend our congratulations to Winnie Byanyima, Dr Sarah Ntiro and Dr Sarah Tamale who have all contributed immensely to the women’s movement in Uganda.

On the occasion of International Women’s Day, AWDF is pleased to release ‘African Woman’. ‘African woman’ is performed by Lady Jay Wah of Pidgen Music, and the version below features the talented musician Sena Dagadu. All royalties from this song have been donated by the artists and Pidgen Music to AWDF’s thematic area of ‘Arts, Culture and Sports’. We thank all the musicians who have been involved in this process for their hard work and generosity.

Click link below to download the track:

african woman

 

PRESS RELEASE

For Immediate Release

Accra, 28th February 2012

 

Celebrate International Women’s Day with the African Women’s Development Fund and Alliance Francaise (Ghana)

Every year on 8^th March the world celebrates International Women’s Day. This year, celebrate International Women’s Day with the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) and our partner, Alliance Francaise (Ghana).

On Thursday, 8^th March 2012 at 6.30 pm attend an art exhibition and reception themed, “Young African Women, Inspiring Futures”, featuring Adowa Amoah, Co-Director of the Foundation for Contemporary Art (FCA) and Fatric Bewong, a painter. Although Adwoa’s medium is primarily painting, she experiments with installations and photography, which extends her language of expression to reflect contemporary situations. Fatric is a contemporary artist whose work incorporates a multifaceted approach to the vibrant colours, textures and rhythms of Ghana’s social landscape.

This exhibition is followed at 8.00pm with a concert featuring Sia Tolno, an award winning musician from Guinea and RFI Discovery Award winner of 2011, as well as Lady Jay Wah of Ghana who will perform a medley of inspiring music, including ‘African woman’, a song specially commissioned by AWDF. Ticket sales for this event are GHC10, with sales and a portion of any art pieces sold supporting AWDF’s ‘Arts, Culture and Sports’ thematic area.

ENDS

About the African Women’s Development Fund

Over the past ten years, the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) has blazed a trail for women’s rights and philanthropy across the African continent. AWDF is an African, not for profit, grantmaking organisation. Since the start of operations in 2001, AWDF has provided US$19 million in grants to 800 women’s organisations in 42 African countries. AWDF’s grant making processes are uniquely designed to meet the needs of African women and activities include the provision of small and larger grants to African women’s organisations, capacity building support and a strong focus on advocacy and movement building.

Press Enquiries

Nana Darkoa Sekyiamah (AWDF Programme Officer for Communications)

Tel: +233 302 521 257 (Ghana)

Email: nana@africlub.net/awdf, Website: www.africlub.net/awdf

Press Release

Immediate

Website: http://www.acbf-pact.org

 

African Capacity Building Foundation signs second phase grant with the African Women’s Development Fund to upscale women’s participation in policy development and implementation on the continent

Accra, 23 February 2012 (ACBF) – The African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) today signed a US$ 2.73 million grant with the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) in Accra. The second phase funding will promote the economic empowerment and political participation of women in Africa, by strengthening AWDF’s institutional and human capacity and increasing the institutional capacity of African Women Organizations to engage effectively on issues of women’s human rights and development in Africa. This follows a successful first phase of US$1 million, which ended in December 2011.

Women and girls constitute over 51% of Africa’s 850 million people. In Sub-Saharan Africa over 70% of the poor are women currently living below the World Bank’s poverty headcount ratio of US$2 per day. According to the 2010 UN progress report on the achievement of the MDGs, although, gender parity has been achieved or is close to being achieved at primary school level in over two-thirds of African countries, Africa has the lowest female literacy rate in the world. Much remains to be done at secondary and tertiary levels. Maternal mortality also remains higher in sub-Saharan Africa than in any other region, and the HIV/AIDS pandemic continues to affect more women than men in most African countries, with women accounting for 60% of new infections. Women also have a harder time finding jobs in environments where there are few opportunities due to job rationing with preference going to men.

Against this challenging background some progress has been made regarding the development of women’s organizations working to promote gender equality and women’s rights in various parts of Africa. These organizations are considered as key drivers in efforts to attain gender equality and end discriminatory and exclusionary practices against women.

Capacity for women’s organisations to deliver on all fronts remains thin and further investment is needed in order to realize women’s human rights and development. Several constraints remain for these organisations, including poor ability to build their own dynamic capacity and ensure they are sustainable in the long term. Other challenges include unstable financing, the constant need to build strategic movement, and the need for conceptual clarity, as well as addressing ideological differences and poor employment opportunities.

Speaking at the Grant signing ceremony, ACBF Executive Secretary, Dr. Frannie Léautier highlighted that ACBF recognizes the importance of equal participation of both women and men in the development and implementation of policies, and the continuous need for capacity development in this area. She said: “It has become evident over time that where women have access to education, economic assets or live free of conflict there is a reduction in poverty levels. At ACBF, we have embarked on our third strategic medium term plan. The strength of this plan lies in the Foundation’s ability to strengthen partnerships with institutions such as the AWDF, where work on gender and women is continentally focussed. This allows the Foundation to have a wider reach, and to also make a larger contribution to the capacity strengthening of women’s organizations”.

She added that through such partnerships there is a shared responsibility to achieve results and develop a critical mass of skilled women to deal with gender issues at national levels, while also focussing on policy and implementation at regional and global levels.

This second phase funding will enable AWDF to innovate through their various platforms and fora to engage fully in the development discourse of women on the continent.”

In her address, AWDF’s Interim Chief Executive Officer, Ms. Theo Sowa said: “We welcome the grant from ACBF to AWDF of 2.7 million dollars over a four-year period but what we appreciate more is the way in which that grant is framed. ACBF is giving AWDF the opportunity to both strengthen our core capacity and to reach out to the various women’s organisations we partner with to strengthen their capacities. This is a wonderful opportunity and one for which ACBF should be praised. Only too often, donors focus on projects, wanting organisations to deliver results on the ground without taking into consideration the need for organisations to be strong and sustainable themselves, if they are to deliver on results. ACBF recognises this and makes its funding available in such a way as to strengthen organisational capacity, sustainability and therefore strengthen the impact of programmes on the ground.”

The implementation of the second phase of this project, which runs from 2011-2015 holds significance, as this period coincides with international and sub-regional benchmarks, such as the African Union Decade for Women, the 15 year review of the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals, including those covering gender, and the review of progress under the SADC Gender and Development Protocol by 2015.

 

Ends: //

About the African Capacity Building Foundation

ACBF was established in February 1991. It is the outcome of collaboration between African governments and the international donor community. Its mission is to build sustainable human and institutional capacity for sustainable growth and poverty reduction in Africa. ACBF’s vision is for Africa to be recognized for its socio-political and economic capabilities and endowments – a continent with effective institutions and policies acquired through sustained investment in people and institutions. The Foundation is a leader, major partner and centre of excellence for capacity building in Africa.

The African Union currently serves as an Observer on the ACBF Board of Governors.

For further information on ACBF, please contact:

c.noumon@acbf-pact.org

a.mpunzwana@acbf-pact.org

r.kambarami@acbf-pact.org

 

African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF)

PO Box 1562, Harare

ZIMBABWE

Tel: + 263 4 700208/210

 

About the African Women’s Development Fund

 

Since the start of operations in 2001, the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) has blazed a trail for women’s rights and philanthropy across the African continent. AWDF has provided US$19 million in grants to 800 women’s organizations in 42 African countries. AWDF’s grant making processes are uniquely designed to meet the needs of African women and include the provision of small grants ($1000-$5000) to community-based organizations, main grants (up to $50,000), capacity building support and a strong focus on movement building.

 

For further information on AWDF, please contact:

Nana Darkoa Sekyiamah (Programme Officer for Communications)

Tel: +233 302 521 257

Email: nana@africlub.net/awdf

Website: www.africlub.net/awdf

 

[Below is a speech delivered today by AWDF’s Interim CEO, Theo Sowa at an event held to welcome the musician and activist Nneka Egbuna as AWDF’s Ambassador for the Arts]

We are delighted to have you with us at AWDF this morning to welcome Nneka Egbuna in her role as AWDF’s Arts Ambassador.

AWDF was founded 11 years ago by three inspirational women – Hilda Tadria, Joanna Foster and Bisi Adeleye Fayemi, who was also AWDF’s founding Executive Director until last year. They created an amazing organisation aimed at supporting women organisations in their work to make real change in women’s lives – to ensure the recognition and implementation of ALL women’s human rights (economic, social, cultural, political etc) across our continent. And in partnership with the organisations we make grants to (some of whom are here today) AWDF has achieved some great milestones. AWDF does grant making, capacity building, advocacy and movement building. We have made over 19 million dollars in grants to more than 800 organisations in 42 African countries.

More importantly, we have been able to support some amazing stories of change – for example, the small group of women in Ghana who started baking loaves in a clay oven and have moved from that to setting up a modern bakery with new infrastructure – the profits from which have established a crèche and sponsored neighbourhood children through school; or the project in Ethiopia where on a site visit after a year, positive women who had previously been on the verge of death were transformed through effective treatment of HIV/AIDS, to the extent where they were strong and vibrant, able to afford to buy their own medications without disruptions to the timeline and support their children – all from the seed of a small grant which allowed them to earn and save money from decent, safe labour. Or the women’s shelter in Nigeria, where the women leveraged the money from AWDF to lobby local people and the local government – resulting in the first shelter for women victims of violence in that country, a place where women and their children could go to and be safe in the face of extreme violence. That group was so effective that the Governor of the state not only put money into the building of the shelter, but took on the torch of helping to get other shelters built in other parts of the country.

There are so many stories of change and each of the AWDF staff has different favourites. But one of the lessons learned during this time is that its not enough to change women’s lives project by project – or even policy by policy… That will take too long – and African women, our children and our communities deserve better – deserve change now!

And so AWDF’s Arts, Culture and Sports thematic area was born.

We have learned that it is not enough to talk about international conventions that promote women’s human rights; about international legislation that outlines national responsibilities for the wellbeing of children and communities; about international, regional and national policies that aim to do everything from eliminating poverty to protecting women from violence. These are important discussions to have and the drive to promote, recognise and realise women’s rights is central to the achievement of well being and inclusive development on our continent and throughout the world. Yet despite these laws, these tools, these policies we live in nations where girls continue to have unequal access to education; where women die giving birth at double, triple and quadruple the rates in countries on other continents; where our mothers, daughters and sisters lives are blighted by violence, and where redress and justice can seem distant dreams.

I think that too often our social, economic and political discussions miss a crucial element that is needed to engender true social change – and that is the human element. We can have the most powerful legislation throughout the world – yet if women don’t know about it, how can they use it to change their lives? Just as importantly, real change is not externally imposed. A wise, feminist mother and mentor once told me that true and sustainable change in any area has to be powered by individual, internal understandings and decisions that come together in collective action and movement. So change in our heads, in our hearts, in our beliefs and in our actions…

And the arts can be powerful catalysts of such individual and collective understandings. Artists can produce works that translate dusty words into clear and heartfelt understandings of issues and ways of dealing with them. Art can touch the souls as well as the minds of countless people, inspiring passion, anger, joy and other emotions that can catalyse action in ways that court cases and academic lectures and even protest marches may never achieve. Art can bring information and meaning into lives in ways that can be more real, more grounded and more influential than any number of texts. Arts – traditional or modern – are integral to our cultural lives… and changes in social, economic and political arenas will never truly take root without parallel changes in our cultural norms, beliefs and practices.

Please don’t think that I am saying that we can achieve social change and justice through art alone. We cannot. But we can and must leverage the transformational power of the arts if we are to achieve and to accelerate real social change.

And that is what our Arts, Culture and Sports programme seeks to do. We hope to use the power of the arts and culture to increase public support for women’s rights, to challenge the negative stereotypes of African women; to document women’s lives and contributions and create new, dynamic and more accurate narratives about African women; to raise the profiles of our amazing African women artists and to use arts and sports to mobilise new constituencies – especially of confident, passionate young women activists.

I have seen traumatised children respond and come to life in music workshops; have seen communities that have been fighting for years come together over games of football; have seen the power of film to touch people’s hearts and change their thinking; have experienced writers whose works have changed my life and motivations (including the wonderful Professor Ama Ata Aidoo who is with us today)…

Join us in using arts, culture and sport to accelerate and leverage the change we want to see.

Thank you.

At a hotel in Entebbe this week, I was subjected to an experience that I would not wish upon my worst enemy. I am a recently retired (but not tired) almost 70 year old married mother of two and grandmother of seven. For many years, I have trained and mentored young people in leadership skills and the art of advocacy, particularly in connection with the subjects of Gender and Human Rights. On Tuesday I was invited to facilitate a session on leadership, using the Four Frames of Leadership to a group of sexual minorities. Another facilitator at the meeting was Hope Chigudu. Like me, Hope is a law-abiding married mother of senior citizenship. A few hours into my session, the Hon. Rev. Simon Lokodo—Minister of Ethics and Integrity—walked into the room.

 

The Minister introduced himself and proceeded to give a lecture on ethics and morality. In addition, he accused the gathering of being an illegal assembly ‘recruiting’ people into homosexuality, even insinuating that we were having sex in the meeting room. Then, in a strange twist of events, the Minister declared the meeting disbanded. Everybody was just told to go home. Kasha Nabagesera, activist and conference Convenor was threatened with arrest, while one of the participants who came from Sweden was challenged to explain how she had even entered the country. Soon after closing the meeting, the Minister was heard telling somebody over the telephone, “Yes, I have just disbanded them.”

 

Prior to his entry into the meeting, the Minister sent a message to the conference Convenor requesting details of the meeting. The program and all the training materials relating to the conference were sent to him, and the Minister asked to sit in on the proceedings. There being nothing to hide, the Convenor invited him to attend the meeting. Little did we know that the Minister would flare up in anger, make baseless accusations about the gathering and order the meeting closed. I was personally shocked by the action of the Minister, and the level of violent infuriation and intolerance he displayed. For a man of God, I saw no compassion, a great deal of prejudice and an utter unwillingness to listen. The Minister was too angry to hear good sense and simply failed to respond to any pleas for reason, ignoring both myself and Hope.

 

Reflecting on what happened on Tuesday, it is quite clear to me that the Minister over-stepped all boundaries of rational behavior. But more importantly, he blatantly violated the Law. In the first instance, every Ugandan has the right to assemble, speak freely and to have an education. This was a workshop convened to conduct training in skills that every citizen is entitled to. Secondly, although the Minister even went so far as to make the laughable claim that the gathering could have been planning a military coup or was plotting to disrupt national security, there is not an iota of evidence to support either claim. But I was most shocked that the Minister asserted that the government had all the right and the power to stop any kind of gathering that was taking place anywhere in the country; what a statement of arrogance and unbridled power! I find this wholly unacceptable and unsupported by any provision in the law. It is well known that if a gathering is to be stopped, there must be reasonable grounds to do so accompanied by the relevant legal documents, such as a court instruction or a Police order. The Hon. Minister was in possession of neither.

 

Tuesday’s actions by the Hon. Minister do not have any support in the 1995 Constitution of Uganda, or in any law known to me. Indeed, as I look ahead to the future Uganda that I want my grandchildren to live and thrive in, it is not the one I witnessed on Tuesday. Impunity comes in many guises; while the fascist actions of that day focused on a small group of activists, there is no telling who the target will be tomorrow. Autocratic government officials like the Rev. Simon Lokodo belong to an era I thought we had left far behind.

By: Dr Hilda Tadria