Category: News

“African Women and Political Participation”

Lecture by

H.E. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf

President of the Republic of Liberia

On the Occasion of the 10^th Anniversary

Of the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF)

Accra, Ghana, Friday, November 12, 2010

Madam Chair, Madam Executive Director;

Your Excellency Madam Vice President of the Republic of Malawi;

The Board of Directors, Officers and Members of the AWDF;

Ministers, Officials of Government;

Members of Parliament;

Members of the Diplomatic Corps;

Donors, Grant Beneficiaries;

Distinguished Guests;

My African Sisters;

Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen:

Heartfelt congratulations to you, AWDF Sisters, on reaching your tenth year! You have succeeded in your goals; you have weathered the global economic crisis; you have demonstrated resilience and determination to succeed in your noble cause to promote leadership and empowerment for African women.

When Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi invited me, almost a year ago, to be a part of the AWDF’s 10^th Anniversary Celebration, she knew that by asking me so far in advance I could not say no, although I was not sure what my schedule would be a whole year away. I agreed, and we duly blocked the dates ensuring that whatever events came before or after November 12^th and 13^th had to give way to my AWDF commitment.

This was a typical Bisi foresight – the same foresight that led her, and colleagues Joanna Foster and Hilda Tadria, to establish the AWDF 10 years ago. Today we can boast of an organization that has funded numerous initiatives to promote African women’s leadership and empowerment here in Ghana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Senegal, Swaziland, Togo, Uganda and Zimbabwe, and many, many more since its founding.

Liberia particularly applauds the AWDF for the role they have played in promoting the welfare of women in our country. The establishment and support of the Sirleaf Market Women Fund has brought together some 12 partners with funding close to $2 million for the construction and renovation of 13 markets throughout the country. This does not include perhaps the first of its kind, the $500,000 donated by the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority for the construction of the Omega Market, which is expected to assist more than 7,000 market women. Bisi, Hilda and Thelma (a former Board Chair), Joanna you played a large role in all of this, a big thank you.

AWDF also played an essential role, as “Theme Lead,” in the preparatory phase of the March 2009 International Women’s Colloquium in Monrovia which brought together some 1,100 women from 54 countries to join some 900 local women in a parallel session. The AWDF was responsible for driving the process for empowering women to be more effective leaders by linking with their peers around the world.

The legacy of that 2009 Colloquium was the establishment of the Angie Brooks International Centre (ABIC) at the University of Liberia campus near Monrovia, which will serve as the implementation mechanism for the Colloquium’s program of work. It will also extend its reach to the Madam Suakoko Center at Cuttington University in rural Liberia. The Center, still in its infancy, has benefited much from AWDF funding and expertise. On behalf of the scores of women who will come to the ABIC to engage in training, research, analysis, partnership, networking and advocacy, and profit from the experiences of others, we express profound thanks to the AWDF.

Certainly with this backdrop of how Liberia has benefitted , I can do no less than to be here today to declare what a singular honor it is for me to deliver a lecture commemorating AWDF’s 10^th anniversary. Any organization with a vision to better and transform the lives of people – most especially African women – is deserving of staunch and unswerving support. I am also proud to be a part of the launching of the Hawa Yakubu Memorial Fund. She was very good to us during the campaign. To the family of Hawa Yakubu, let me say how grateful I am for the role she played in my success. [applause]

To the host city, Accra, let me confess that I always welcome the occasion to visit Ghana – a country that sets the standard as a role model of success for Africa in so many ways, and which has been, and remains, a refuge for so many Liberians. Thank you, Ghana, for your gracious hospitality and warmth, and for the wonderful reception we always receive whenever we are in this country. [applause]

AFRICAN WOMEN’S POLITICAL PARTICIPATION

Dear Sisters; Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen:

The topic of today’s Seminar, “African Women and Political Participation,” is one on which I can speak with some authority – as an African, as a woman, and as a politician.

Every woman here knows, or has experienced, the difficulty in bringing women into the fold of political participation across our continent – from the grassroots up to the highest office in the land.

You are here this evening because you believe that women’s full political participation can and must happen, not only in Rwanda, South Africa or Mozambique, but in all corners of this vast continent that is our home. In overcoming the multiple challenges which we as African women confront, it is vital that there be trailblazers such as the AWDF which are striving determinedly for all our women to be empowered.

We are seeing progress in African women’s participation in politics, no doubt, although not at the levels we demand. The job of full equality and total empowerment is incomplete. Let us remember that in the fight to empower women, we can accept no frontiers, only breakthroughs. [applause]

Governance cuts across all spheres of representation and decision-making, from the community to national levels. Full political participation will become a reality for us, as women, when quotas and set-asides become a relic of the past; when our access in participatory institutions at all levels is considered a right; and when we no longer feel compelled to wage campaigns and stage protests in order to have a say in the decisions that affect our lives – be it at the peace table or in the political and economic arenas.

There is power in numbers. The lone female voices one encounters in political circles, including in Africa, are insufficient to effect the changes that are so important to women. As a tiny minority in governance, women could be subjected to pressures, and their capacities as representatives, policy makers and decision takers are constrained by their numbers. We still need those numbers in critical mass to make those decisions and make them stick. In such low numbers, and with insufficient clout, women ministers tend to be relegated to, and concentrated in, social areas rather than legal, economic, political and technical functions of government.

It goes without saying that when women are represented in critical numbers in parliaments, as well as at the grassroots level, their perspectives and interests will be taken into account and their concerns given higher priority. Greater political participation will also allow women to make a meaningful impact on democracy, and to sustain the effort for the empowerment and representation of women.

A GLOBAL OVERVIEW

Dear Friends: The low political participation by women is not limited to Africa; it is global, with the Nordic countries being among the notable exceptions.

Today, out of 192 United Nations Member States, there are only 18 women, either elected or appointed in the highest positions of government. That figure inched up by one with the election, just last week, of Dilma Rousseff as the first female Head of State of Brazil. [applause] When she takes office in January 2011, she will preside over the largest country in Latin America, with a population of over 192 million, 45 percent of which are people of African descent. We welcome her to our tiny circle. [laughter]

Globally, women’s representation in parliaments stands at 18.2 percent – the highest it has ever been, but still not high enough. Today only 22 countries have achieved a critical mass of 30 percent or higher women representation in their national parliaments, mainly as a result of constitutional quotas written into law and requiring that a certain percentage of political positions be occupied by women.

Of that number, six are African countries: Burundi, Mozambique, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda. These countries succeeded because they recognized the importance of equity between women and men in decision-making and they instituted changes in their electoral and parliamentary processes.

The world applauds Rwanda as having the highest number of women parliamentarians, at 56.3 percent, followed by Sweden, at 47 percent. Rwanda succeeded by implementing a gender quota system. With a population of 70 percent female following the 1994 genocide, women had to assume traditional male roles. Able, finally, to participate in the drafting of a new constitution and new legislative structures, they pushed for greater equality in politics through such initiatives as a constitutional quota and election law quotas to ensure women’s place at the political table. Rwanda serves as a case study, an example for other countries seeking a more equal representation of women in politics.

Let us also recognize South Africa, which leapt from 17^th to 3^rd place, behind Rwanda and Sweden, in the global ranking. That country has experienced an 11 percent increase in women’s political representation, from 34 percent to 45 percent. Prior to democratic elections held there in 1994, there were only 2.7 percent of women in the South African Parliament; the figure increased to 27 percent following the elections and has been growing ever since. We applaud the enlightened male leaders who played key roles in this success.

My country, Liberia, is a strong advocate of the seminal UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security, which seeks greater representation of women at all decision-making levels in politics and in crisis management activities. We are only at 12 percent – the highest it has ever been in Liberia – yet far below an acceptable percentage of women in our National Legislature or in other leadership areas.

Women’s groups are pressuring for 30 percent political representation. The Gender Equity in Politics Act 2010, sponsored by the Women Legislative Caucus, is now before the Legislature. It calls for no less than 30 percent representation of women in national elected offices and political parties. As you may well imagine, the proposed legislation is facing serious challenges from a male-dominated Legislature, whose members argue that competition, rather than gender, should be the criterion for representation. Since there is no mutual exclusivity here, you can be assured that our women are neither defeated nor are they backing down, and we will continue to push until this necessary objective is achieved.

The number of women in our Cabinet, our National Legislature and the Judiciary continues to increase; not as fast as we want, but in significant enough numbers so that progress is measurable and noticeable.

You may have heard, or read, that a week ago I created a bit of turbulence when I placed my entire Cabinet on administrative leave, including the six female Ministers who held strategic positions at the Justice, Foreign Affairs, Agriculture, Commerce, Gender and Development, and Youth and Sports Ministries. Let me put on record that our women Ministers have been effective and transparent in leadership, and I have no doubt that the majority – all of them dynamic, hard-working, imbued with integrity, and wholly committed to our development agenda – and you can be sure they will continue their invaluable service to our country. [applause]

At the local governmental level, our women are visible, with 40 percent representation. Women serve as superintendents in 6 of our 15 counties; as mayors of cities, including our capital, Monrovia; as heads of public corporations, including the National Port Authority, the gateway to our nation’s economy. Junior Ministers across sectors account for more than 30 percent of women in our government.

In recognition of our efforts to empower, support, and protect women in our society, including the implementation of Liberia’s National Plan of Action on Resolution 1325 – one of the first to be concluded in Africa –Liberia was named the winner of this year’s prestigious Millennium Development Goal Three Award. [applause] We owe that to all of you who have been a part of our success. We were recognized for outstanding leadership, commitment and progress toward the achievement of MDG-3 through the promotion of gender equality and women’s empowerment across the country.

POLITICAL PARTICIPATION: THE 1990s AND BEYOND

The gains in women’s political participation in Africa did not happen overnight; they have been earned over decades by Sisters who dared to challenge the status quo. Prior to the 1990s, it was unthinkable – in my country, for sure – that a woman could run for the presidency in Africa. In 1997, I challenged that stereotype and ran for President of Liberia. I lost, bested by a well-financed military machine. I ran again in 2003 for Chairman of the Interim Government right here in Accra during the peace talks. Although I received the highest vote from the participating civilian groups, the warring factions with regional backing placed the leadership in others hands, in retrospect, a blessing in disguise. Undeterred, I ran for President again in 2005, and this time the outcome was in my favor.

I am proud to be the first democratically elected female President in Africa. [applause] It is my fervent hope, and prayer, that what I accomplished will not be a one-off; that a woman running for President in Africa will become the norm, not the exception, for many more women across our continent. [applause]

I continue to be encouraged by the women with whom I interact across Africa. They see in my presidency a validation of something they have always believed, that “It is possible. We can make it happen.” You in this room have to work to make it happen. It is my great privilege to be a source of inspiration to you, the women of Africa, with aspirations to occupy the highest political positions in the land.

Other African women have dared to run for the highest office in their countries since my first attempt. Charity Ngilu and Nobel Laureate Wangari Maathai ran in Kenya’s 1998 presidential election, and Ngilu ran again in 2002; Tanzania, Sierra Leone and more recently Guinea and Cote d’Ivoire have seen women compete. Dr. Sarah Jibril of Nigeria, for the fifth time, has thrown her hat into the race for the upcoming 2011 presidential elections. Despite their unsuccessful bids, these women, undaunted, set important precedents and several have assumed other important leadership roles. We have one right here with us today, the Vice President of Malawi. Africa needs more daring women to step forward. [applause]

Prior to the 1990s, the only female African Heads of State got there by virtue of being royalty – Zauditu, Empress of Ethiopia, who ruled between 1917 and 1930; and two who served for brief periods as Queen-regents of Swaziland in the 1980s. Africa’s first female Prime Minister was Elizabeth Domitien of the Central African Republic, who served in the 1970s.

In the 1990s, African women claimed national leadership visibility in noticeable numbers. Liberia’s Ruth Perry served on the six-member collective presidency, chairing the Council of State between 1996 and 1997. Uganda’s Wandera Specioza Kazibwe became the first female Vice President in 1994. From 1993 to 1994, women served as Prime Ministers of Burundi and of Rwanda, while Senegal claimed a female Vice President in 2001. Gambia continues to have a very active female Vice President and in like mode is our dear Sister from Malawi who is here with us today. Countries in East and Southern Africa have also had women as Speakers and Deputy Speakers of Parliament.

Africa, which had the lowest female participation in politics in the 1960s, is today seeing the fastest rates of growth of women in politics. A comparative analysis with other parts of the world would conclude that some African countries are doing relatively well, although none come close to proportionately representing women – Rwanda, again, being the exception. Women have made important strides in terms of political participation and their rise to top-level economic and political management portfolios, but there is still a huge gender gap worldwide, and a long way to go before women can be treated as full equals and partners to their male counterparts.

At the same time, we are seeing the growth of groups that campaign for women’s political leadership, press for legislative and constitutional changes, and conduct civic education. This divergence commenced in the 1990s when women began to form their own political parties because existing ones in the multiparty context did not adequately address women’s concerns. Women founded the National Party in Zambia in 1991, the Zimbabwe Union of Democrats in 1999, Kopanang Basotho in Lesotho, as well as women-led parties in Kenya, the Central African Republic, and in Angola.

Let me recall some of the factors that account for African women’s new visibility in the political arena as independent actors:

Ø The move towards multi-party politics which lessened the need for mass organizations linked to and directed by a single ruling party;

Ø Increased educational opportunities for girls and women which created a larger pool of capable women who were positioned to vie for political power;

Ø An increasing number of women experienced in creating and sustaining associations and social and economic networks;

Ø The availability of donor funds, channeled through international and local NGOs like the AWDF, religious groups, and foundations, which spurred the growth of national-level organizations that support women’s participation in civic education, constitutional and legislative reform, leadership training and programs for women parliamentarians; and

Ø Stronger commitment to women’s increased representation by a country’s leadership, especially ones with female Heads of State.

The emergence of these independent associations means that for the first time many women’s movements could select their own leaders and set their own agendas.

CHALLENGES IN THE POLITICAL ARENA

Despite the advances I have cited, women have yet to see enormous payoffs in being elected into office and receiving political appointments. An important reason is that women often lack the resources, political experience, education and political connections to run for office. Popular perceptions are that a woman’s place is in the home, and in the kitchen, rather than in politics and corporate boardrooms. Cultural attitudes which constrain women’s involvement in politics persist among men and women. These are oftentimes reflected in voting patterns, media coverage of female politicians, as well as attempts to suppress women’s assertion of their political rights and views.

Such attitudes are not helped by the fact that women themselves are many times reluctant to run for office, stemming from cultural prohibitions on women being seen and speaking in public in front of men or challenge them. Where these prohibitions are strong, men do not listen to women who take the podium or are active in politics.

Campaigning and being a leader often involves travel and time away from home, all of which put women politicians at risk and at a disadvantage due to gender bias. Would-be female politicians may find themselves and their families under attack or the subject of malicious gossip. Some husbands forbid their wives from engaging in politics, fearing that they will interact with other men [laugh], or worrying that their spouse’s political preoccupations will divert her attention from the home.

How, then, can we address and overcome the hurdles placed in women’s path towards political participation and representation? It is one thing to legislate that women be represented at all decision-making levels; it is quite another to change the attitudes and mind-set of those who would obstruct that access. With men making up the other half of the world’s 6.8 billion people, it is imperative that we reach out to them if we are to succeed in our overall goals and objectives. We have to work harder.

Together with efforts to persuade men of the need to allow women political space and access, grassroots action is also essential in order to groom future women political leaders. That will require advocates to: develop rosters of viable female candidates to participate fully in the political arena; encourage women to register to vote and educate them about the electoral processes; teach female aspirants how to run effective campaigns; and enhance their leadership capacity. Female aspirants will also require training in how to seek elective offices, to articulate the issues, and how to acquire funding in order to run successful campaigns. Unless we can train and prepare women to compete for political office at all levels, their representation and participation in political bodies will remain low until such time that legislation setting gender quotas are enacted into law.

AFRICA’S FUTURE: ITS WOMEN

Africa faces many challenges, all of them highlighted in the Millennium Development Goals – poverty, high illiteracy, sexual violence, high infant and maternal mortality rates, HIV/AIDS, the effects of climate change, and a litany of other woes. In such a landscape, let us not make the mistake of not harnessing the potential of one-half of Africa’s population – its women.

Africa’s history is replete with incidences of the marginalization and exclusion of women. That history likewise shows the incredible potential of women to persevere, to lead, to resolve conflict, and to move a country from chaos onto the path of social and economic development.

I can recall in Liberia’s own experience that it was the women, notably the Mano River Women Peace Network (MARWOPNET), the Liberia Women Initiative, among others, who labored and advocated for peace. I pledged, upon assuming office, that my Administration would endeavor to give Liberian women prominence in all affairs of our country; to empower them in all areas of our national life; to support and expand the laws to restore women’s dignity and deal drastically with crimes that dehumanized them; to encourage families to educate the girl child; and to provide programs to enable our women to participate in our nation’s economic revitalization.

To ensure that in the Liberia of tomorrow, women will have full equality with men, special focus is being directed at educating, capacitating and empowering girls and young women who, despite certain gains, continue to lag behind the men in access to education, resources and opportunities. The glaring reality, in Liberia and elsewhere, is that, from the beginning of their lives, female children get less attention, less education, less of everything. Girls’ education and, in some places, girls’ lives, are treated as less valuable, thereby establishing a pattern that constrains women their entire lives, affecting their ability to make decisions at all levels of their societies.

We are therefore training our people to understand the vitality of girls’ education, to appreciate that when you educate a girl, you educate a family, a nation. At the same time, we are emphasizing the important role that can be played by women in the informal sector, those who sweat and blood keep our economy vibrant in difficult times. Literacy and skills training for our market and grass-roots women are a must for women advancement.

I think it is prophetic that, less than a week after a speech in the United States about “Africa and Its Place in the World,” I am here discussing a related topic. I told the audience in Richmond, Virginia, that despite significant gains, much remains to be done about the place of women in African society, and that Africa’s future as an engine of global economic growth will be directly linked to the status of women on the continent. [applause] For in the long run, Ladies and Gentlemen, this continent will rise when women take roles as educated and equal partners in society. There is no doubt in my mind that women are the future of Africa, and its leaders must invest in women’s development, if they want their country, and our continent, to advance in the 21^st century and beyond.

At my Inaugural, in January 2006, I addressed the women of Africa, Sisters all. I said, then, that I am one of you; that I know what you go through daily, confronting tremendous odds, for I have been there. I feel your enormous support in all that I am endeavoring to achieve, and I am keenly sensitive of your expectations from me. I promised not to disappoint you, not to let you down. I trust that I am keeping that promise.

I feel honored, to stand here, not only as a woman leader and representative of the people of Liberia, but also of women throughout Africa and the world, in our just and determined struggle to play a more prominent role in society.

I see myself as representing the aspirations and expectations of women everywhere. My success is your success, as it opens the door even wider to many other women who will step up. As women, there is a commonality in what we go through. For no matter where we come from, there is still a measure of discrimination to overcome because of our gender. It is imperative that we work together, and pull together, and be supportive of each other, in order to strengthen and uplift women everywhere.

Finally, let me again congratulate the African Women’s Development Fund for reaching this milestone. I urge the many donors to continue their financial and in-kind support, and call upon the beneficiaries of these grants to ensure that they are well spent.

I thank you.

PRESS RELEASE

For Immediate Release

The African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) Celebrates its 10^th Anniversary in Accra, Ghana, November 11^th – 13^th

In June 2000, the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) was launched through the efforts of its co-founders, Joana Foster (Ghana), Dr Hilda Tadria (Uganda) and Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi (Nigeria). AWDF is the first Africa-wide grant-making foundation and a decade after its launch is recognized as a leading feminist philanthropic institution on the continent. Over the past 10 years, AWDF has disbursed over US$15 million in grants to 800 African women’s rights organizations across the African continent and through its comprehensive capacity building programme strengthened institutions and progressive movements on the continent.

AWDF culminates its 10^th Anniversary celebrations in Accra, Ghana with a schedule of events including:

• Thursday 11^th November 2010, 10:00am – Commissioning of a multi-purpose resource centre purchased by AWDF for Women United Against AIDS in Ghana (WUAGG), Ayensu River Estate, Damfa. The Honourable Stephen Lewis, Co-Director of AIDS Free World and former UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa will commission the building.

• Thursday 11^th November 2010, 4:00pm – A convening on African women using the arts to promote social justice and a Premiere of ‘The Motherland Tour’ with Special Guest Yvonne Chaka Chaka at the Holiday Inn Hotel, Accra.

• Friday 12^th November 2010, 9:00am – 4.30pm – A Seminar on Political Participation with Special Guest, Vice-President Joyce Banda of Malawi at La Palm Royal Hotel, Accra

• Friday 12^th November 2010, 4.30pm – AWDF’s Anniversary Lecture delivered by President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf of Liberia at La Palm Royal Beach Hotel, Accra

• Saturday 13^th November 2010, 6.30pm – The Purple Ball and Women of Substance Awards honouring African women working tirelessly to make a difference in their communities, La Palm Royal Beach Hotel, Accra.

According to Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi, Executive Director of AWDF and the First Lady of Ekiti State Nigeria, “ In its 10 years of existence AWDF has been extremely successful at creating spaces and amplifying the voices of African women within the continent and beyond. We have done this by resourcing African women’s organizations, supporting the participation of African women in international processes and re-invigorating the African women’s movement. On the occasion of our 10^th Anniversary we wish to honour and recognize the numerous African women who work tirelessly for social justice and women’s empowerment.”

AWDF’s Women of Substance Awardees 2010 are:

Abeka Perez – Young Women Campaign Against AIDS, Kenya

Felicia Darkwa – Nana Yaa Memorial Trust for Good Quality Reproductive Health, Ghana

Hadijah Kisembo – Disabled Women’s Network and Resource Organisation (DWNRO), Uganda

Kafui Adjamgbo-Johnson – Women in Law and Development, (WILDAF) Togo

Leymah Gbowee – Women Peace and Security Network Africa, (WIPSEN-Africa), Liberia

Nyoka Agnes – Member of Parliament, Sudan

Prof. Bene Madunagu – Girls’ Power Initiative, Nigeria

Prudence Mabele – Positive Women’s Network (PWN), South Africa

Dr Rose Mensah Kutin – Abantu for Development, Ghana

Special guests from across Africa, Europe and the United States are attending AWDF’s 10^th Anniversary activities in Accra, including:

Her Excellency, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Liberia

Her Excellency, Vice President Joyce Banda, Malawi

Her Excellency Mrs Funmilayo Olayinka, Deputy Governor of Ekiti State, Nigeria

Her Excellency, Mrs Abimbola Fashola, First Lady of Lagos State, Nigeria

Her Ladyship Justice Irene Charity Danquah, Justice of the Court of Appeal, Ghana

Honourable Stephen Lewis, Co-Director, AIDS Free World, United States of America

Honourable Akua Dansua, Minister for Youth & Sports, Ghana

Honourable Juliana Azumah-Mensah, Minister for Women & Children’s Affairs, Ghana

Honourable Hannah Tetteh, Minister for Trade & Industry, Ghana

Dr Adhiambo Odaga, West Africa Representative, Ford Foundation, Nigeria

ENDS

Press Enquiries

Nana Darkoa Sekyiamah (Programme Officer for Communications)

Tel: +233 302 521 257

Email: nana@africlub.net/awdf

Website: www.africlub.net/awdf

We are here because of Nollywood. For some this is a reason for celebration, to others it is rather cause for anxiety. However, that such debate even rages is a sign that Nollywood has become an institution to reckon with. And being an institution brings with it responsibilities. Nollywood can no longer be indulged as the “Johnny-come-lately” bad boy of movie making; recently recognized as the third largest moving making business in the world, after Hollywood and Bollywood; this means it grosses more money than industries of older standing such as England and Italy, thus it is an industry that can no longer be treated as a child passing through its terrible twos. At the very least it is an industry that has gained its first degree, and we expect more of college graduates than we do of those still struggling through High School.

In many ways, a part of this success can be attributed to the question of technology. Nollywood is an industry that basically skipped the film stage, and went first to video, then was truly liberated by digital. As with music making, the symbiotic relationship between technology and creativity must be acknowledged. This even affects what I can call the social relations of film –making; as for instance that location work predominates over studio work, and as is common with Black independent film makers in Europe and the United States, producers and directors and actors work constantly with each other in stable communities which resemble early Hollywood contract studio system, but without either the studios or the contracts, which has proved a way of promoting and supporting each other in their growth as artists.

The issues to be addressed by this film forum on “women and the dynamics of representation” have been of concern for those who think about such things as “representation” for centuries. But let me begin first with the word “dynamics”, a term that suggests forces that produce change or motion. Nollywood is indeed a force, the existence of such a mass of films, now available, and watched in every corner of the globe, has indeed produced change, it is the nature of that change with respect to women that we are here to deliberate on – we are concerned here with what the force of the dynamo means for those of us embodied to walk this earth as women, and at this forum we are as concerned about women in film as women on film. That is the dynamics of representation ultimately have as urgent force when thinking of women in the film industry behind the scenes as the more self evident sense of women projected on the screen, which is where I will begin.

How women are presented to audiences in a number of media has been of concern for a number of women and women’s movements around the world. As human beings we all become concerned about how we are seen by others, how we are re-presented to the world, especially by others who do not count themselves as one of our number. And when we do not see ourselves reflected, or reflected as we would like, the need for redress, to challenge the discrepancies between how we see ourselves and how you know ourselves to be seen, becomes a powerful driving force, and not just for women. It is of no small consideration, for it has led around the world to powerful social movements- as we know centuries of being seen as “niggers”, being denigrated, which in its Latin root literally means to blacken or “niggerfy” and being classified as social inferiors with attendant social consequences and legal restrictions led to revolutions from the American South to South Africa.

I remind us therefore that the context for this forum rests firmly in the arena of a very broad historical context where issues concerning “the image of Africa” meet those concerning “the image of women”, black women in particular, though in this regard because of the former- the image of Africa- women of African descent have not always even been seen as a subset of “women” in general but of somehow a species apart from female humanity.

Out there in the world the image of Africa, and the women in it or who have historically come from it is not positive. There is not time to rehearse these images here neither do I at this juncture wish to launch into a history of the genealogy of these images about which I can teach whole graduate courses. So forgive me if I simply resort to the shorthand terms we use to conjure up a wealth of images and the ideas associated with them. After centuries, at least in the western world we are still the dark continent, today refined to become more politically correct by speak more euphemistically of underdevelopment, necessary aid, culture bound etc. our people are still somehow lesser, less intelligent, less capable, less whatever. When it comes to our women the situation gets more aggravating…

Yet why does this anxiety about historical images matter? Surely we tell ourselves the marketing of such images is over, or since we have become independent we have control of our own representation so what does the colonial past matter? It matters for two reasons, the first is that the success of Nollywood means that what we do is avidly received in those very places that has created and marketed these negative images, and they have not gone away. The second is indeed that the major audience is ourselves, whether at home or abroad, so what are we telling ourselves and the rest of the world about ourselves? Are we countering or feeding this legacy of hostile images of ourselves?

The Nollywood film industry, willingly or unwittingly, carries on its shoulders the hopes and expectations of a people. Perhaps the situation can be compared to the burdens placed on the shoulders of African-American writers in the middle of the twentieth century who had to grapple with the interface between artistic freedom and social expectations. Was Richard Wright justified in creating a monster like Bigger Thomas to prove his ideological point that desperate social circumstances beyond one’s control produce desperate people, or did he merely validate the negative stereotype that all young Black men are brutes and rapists? A generation later when Alice Walker gave us Celie in The Color Purple was she showing how no matter what the degradations, women’s sisterhood and solidarity could lead to personal emancipation, or was she, justly accused of merely adding further fuel to the fire engulfing the besieged masculinity of Black men.

It is not insignificant that the furor over the Color Purple blazed more furiously, leading to demonstrations against the actors and the picketing of the Oscars, when it was turned into a successful film by Steven Spielberg. It is not necessary to say, especially in a forum such as this, that in terms of contemporary entertainment, film is arguably the most popular art form of narrative communication around the world today. Something that causes a spark when published in print can turn into a forest fire when presented on the screen. Controversial as the novel The Last Temptation of Christ was when published in 1960 by Nikolas Kazantzakis, that uproar paled when compared to the fury unleashed when it was made into a film directed by Martin Scorsese which reached a much wider general audience in 1988. It can also work the other way; I am sure J.K. Rowling the writer of the Harry Potter series of children’s books today goes to the bank quite happy that she need never write another word in life if she doesn’t choose to!

Nollywood faces the same agonies and choices as all the other ‘woods’ have faced. The point I am emphasizing is that the question of the responsibility for images is not peculiar to Nigeria or to film-makers, but is the concern of all artists; however that responsibility becomes magnified when the medium is an influential and popular one, such as film is.

If I can digress for a moment, looking at Nollywood films from the perspective of someone who has spent her life wrestling with the question of the “image of Africa” in the western world, I must say that for me one of the huge benefits of the success of this film industry, regardless of the quality of the stories being told, is finally we have a huge body of works which show what the exteriors and interiors of modern Africa look like. Most of these films are shot on location and convey the grittiness of the streets, and has made them familiar. There is a texture to the look of Lagos or Accra that is refreshing to see, especially after living with the notion that there is no modernity in Accra, that we have no capital cities that can rival those of the west. The first time I showed a slide of Abidjan to a class of students they all but though I was lying.

But to return to the other point that I was trying to make; that of the variability and unpredictability of audience. Kazantzakis was careful not to betray the end results of the biblical account of Jesus of Nazareth- he did not in the end succumb to the temptations of the flesh. Nonetheless, there were Christians who considered the very idea of the temptation of Jesus The Christ tantamount to blasphemy. However even when not dealing with theologically sensitive subjects, the concerns raised by images projected upon us or any individual or group we identify with, we carry with us. Thus a forum such as this must raise acute questions regarding the impact of the production and proliferation of the images that concern us here; the images we produce and promote ourselves and send out into the world. We are concerned here with film and with women in film in every aspect. How do we tell our stories? Who is to tell them? Who has access to the storytelling apparatus that film embodies?

It is always a heated debate whether artists are creators or reflectors of the society that support their work. There can be no doubt that we can learn a lot about a people through what we read and see about a society. Still, sorting through the manifold impressions and emotions that art evokes can be complex in a number of ways. One film about a drug addict could be seen as an exploration of a social problem. A number of films in which drug addicts routinely appear, or are referred to, spoken about, drop in casually or are otherwise a part of the fabric of the life being portrayed, can leave the impression that this is a society where drug addiction is endemic if not epidemic, is an integral part of everyday life not to say a social problem.

Thus we also need to take account of what I can call the multiplier effect. We must respect the integrity of every individual story, but we must also be concerned with the multiplier effect of a number of individual stories conveying similar things which then multiply to become a collective story. When this happens it must give us pause for thought. For example, my mother had four sons. My four brothers have each of them married between 1978 and 1984 that is they have all be married for between twenty five and thirty years giving our mother, cumulatively an excess of one hundred years of being a mother-in-law before she passed away. And in all that century, I do not remember any violent disagreements, of her calling or being called a shrew by my sisters-in-law, any necessary escapes by them to avoid her witchcraft or any attempt by her to undermine their marriages because they were unsuitable harridans who on top of everything could not even cook a decent meal! And wonderful as I know my mother to have been, I do not believe she was the only mother of sons in the whole of West Africa who appreciated the complexities of married life, appreciated that her sons had made the best choices they could and the women they married were doing the best they could to lead their lives with integrity and raise their children in unanimity and was thus prepared to leave all three couples to it! (But perhaps you will all tell that is because they had at least provided her with a dozen grandchildren and therefore could be exempted from the general box of unpleasant spells that mother in laws cast!) I think you get the point. This multiplier effect can be most instructive for good or ill.

With respect to representing contemporary African women to a larger audience, Nollywood has had sometimes deservedly, a lot of hits. But the critiques arise out of respect for its successes, if no one watched the films; it would not matter quite so much. (I have been told that the largest market outside Nigeria is not Ghana, or even London, but Canada). Wherever it is, Nollywood has put African film making on the map in spectacular ways, and has with incredible alacrity its products have become widespread enough to bear a discussion on the implications of its communicative power.

To illustrate: it is reviewing a number of films in preparation for this forum that made me sub-title these remarks “Of Cooking, Cars, and Gendered Culture”, though in truth that is a paper that yet remains to be written. Let me explain: although in everyday parlance when we speak of “culture” people’s minds go to Zulu spears, Ndebele beads, Igbo masquerades or Asante kente cloth depending on which part of the continent we are focused on, we should recognize that the real essence of culture is not so much the things we see, but the things we take for granted; not the song and dance routines we third world peoples put on for tourists to admire as proof positive we do even have culture, but the things we believe and hold fast to because they structure the sense of meaning in our lives. The things mentioned above are important to their peoples, but not primarily for the chic market value they have now come to have. And there are other, non-marketable things that are so ingrained in us we scarcely notice; like the different ways in which we greet each other – bowing to our elders, shaking hands from the left and so on, these are the deep strata cultural things seldom articulated that reflect our sense of our selves as people.

Watching these films I became aware of two striking motifs, both of them reflections of our society, one ancient, and the other more contemporary. It was very noticeable the extent to which food remains an index of gender relations and in particular a woman’s moral standing. And I do not mean only the idea of the rural woman’s sweat in her determination to grow crops to feed her children. The films also reflect what appears to be our abiding social truth that in heterosexual relationships whether or not you have a good thing going in a woman is how well she feeds you. Urban or rural, professional, unemployed, or a homemaker, no matter what, feeding is an index of a woman’s moral worth. I have seen only one instance of which feeding a woman with the labour of his own hands (as opposed to in a chic restaurant) was indicative of a man’s seriousness in a relationship. We can, and perhaps should have a conversation about what the automatic and assumed acceptance of this means for us in the early twentieth century, but the point I want to make here, is anyone watching these films, en masse, will learn quite correctly that, rightly or wrongly, in West African cultures at least into the first decade of the twentieth-first century, the cooking, and sharing of food remained a major index of cultural significance. As students and critics of popular culture this can be important to note.

What of the cars? These were as noticeable as the plates of badly or well cooked food but they seemed to have a different resonance. Where the matter of food seems an almost unquestioned sign of womanhood, to be taken for granted as it were, the cars were not an unconscious signifier. Rather they were, in film after film singled out by the camera, frequently lovingly caressed by it, not as a taken for granted aspect of character, but as a potent symbol of a man’s (frequently rising) power. A woman is expected to be able to cook, what is noteworthy, to her detriment, is when she can not. The ability is the status quo. In contrast men are not assumed to have cars, so every car rebounds to their worth and value on an ever increasing scale according to the value of the car. So fixed a sign of potent masculinity has the car become that in one film it was also used as the index of the extent to which the men who drove them were held in regard or pampered by the sugar mamas who kept them happy. Interestingly in that film, though they acted as a sign of her buying power, they reflected socially to his glory. In this particular film, the women’s access to cars was indicative of their corruption. Furthermore, by providing the men with them, they provided them with the instruments with which those gigolos could then play the fool by using them to impress women other than the ones who had purchased them. I will return to this issue shortly, the point I am making here, is that for good or ill these films give us clues to world view and culture of the societies which support them, whether by indicating fixed assumptions – as in the case of women and cooking- or signifying a symbol of flux and change- as in men and cars.

This is why the plethora of “saints, whores, nags and witches” raises such concern. The sessions of this forum tell the story of the complexity of the issues we face. In the films made by us, we must acknowledge we have made great strides in the images we present of ourselves in our stories, but we still have a great way to go. After the struggle waged by e.g. African American women in Hollywood to even be allowed to represent beauty and glamour, not to speak of sexuality, we are ahead of the game, but still need to ask, to what end? On that side of the Atlantic they had to struggle to be regarded as a social acceptable body beautiful. Over here, we have no problem with the concept of an African woman’s body as beautiful, our actresses are manifestly attractive and flaunt it on screen, though we do have to ask sometimes to what end this glorification of the body, especially in a context where the validation of woman’s sexuality outside of heterosexual marriage is still seen as a potential source of problems.

We do have plenty of storylines which reflect our lives as they are lived. Sort of. That is we do have films depicting young people in love, and young people having sex, and the women are not necessarily required to be virgins. Yet if we study carefully the development of the storylines, a number of issues arise. So often, even when supposedly college girls with no time for studying, they have time to pursue men and seduce them with their wealth, cars and bodies; yes, when unmarried women own cars it is seldom to any good end, it is a sign of women who do not know boundaries, of women who transgress.

The choice of the tongue in cheek title of the session for writers is unfortunately not so tongue in cheek. Much of the ire against the Nollywood industry has come precisely because these are the dominant images that we grapple with. I often wish, when I visit yet another office showing “African Magic” movies of wicked wives and greedy mistresses 24/7 one more time, I could issue a blanket decree banning it from the airwaves. I do not want to see anymore women actually turning into snakes before our eyes, or metamorphosing into blood suckers for the sake of gold truly believing that that is the sole objective of life.

Yet as an artist, I also recognize that this gut reaction borders on policing. Where do we draw the line between demanding socially responsible art and policing the artist, and besides, can we police morality or demand, as opposed to desire, socially responsible art forms; and again, as I asked before, must our art be required to be what we consider positive, for then when does it become propaganda, why not be content with reflecting what is, however discomforting that may be?

In short, what is the purpose of our storytelling, for make no mistake; filmmaking is simply the latest, or one of the latest forms of collective storytelling. But modern storytelling faces a complex set of situations. If you will forgive the resort to the cliché of grandmothers by the compound fireside or under the village tree, what happens when the audience is no longer a cohesive clan with shared history and antecedents and a relatively shared common set of goals, but has translated into the “global village” of both kinsmen and spies.

Human stories, whether mythic tales or proverbs and riddles have always served, in every society, the purpose of enabling, and even empowering societies to make sense of the world around them. When they encompass the grand issues of human existence, what is the source of life, or the nature of the divine, they exist in the realm of sacred myth, but as we know, even good local stand up comedians can help us comprehend the messiness, and seemingly intractable problems of human living. A cartoon about a destooled chief can be more powerful than volumes of ink spend on condemning his behaviour.

And on the subject of chiefs and village grandmothers, what indeed do we do with our past and its legacies and continuities? What do we do with those stories, those forms of living, those ways of being? And certainly one of the issues indeed facing us as modern people is making clear to ourselves and others, that there is no rupture between “then” and “now”. Some years ago I used an illustration for this point which I would like to repeat here: A few years ago I was invited to Rochester institute of Technology to conduct a faculty development workshop. So whilst there, I took the opportunity of visiting the Eastman Kodak museum. I was fortunate that it was the year of the centenary of the Brownie, and amongst the many events celebrating that little camera, which was the first camera of almost everyone I know, was a glorious display of every brownie ever made, displayed in chronological order. We could all mark our age group by the camera we first knew. What was very striking was that if you looked at only the first and the last in the series, the two cameras had nothing in common. Yet seen on display with the dozens of intervening cameras also displayed, the differences between each were only small and incremental, at times barely perceptible, and the links between the cameras at their different stages, irrefutable. It might be fruitful to think of that vexed word tradition in that manner. With each manifestation of a “traditional” ceremony, what is produced is its own variant, dependent on its own time, space and ritual acts and immediate needs. Nothing remains static … this is the health of ritual. [Each re-enactment] in form and performance carries the echo of that remembered form which each performance both recalls and gives the lie to. So, for example, to commemorate deaths in exiles, instead of sitting in open spaces outside the family home, we hire church halls, and do the things that need to be done, improvising from necessity to create something new we dress in the language of tradition, sometimes amazing and bemusing our neighbors because of the sudden influx of people, particular colour, public ceremony and noise that Ghanaian funerals generate, which seem incomprehensible unless you understand the culture of mourning. The danger is the extent to which we are all capable of genesis amnesia, forgetting the cameras in between. So how do we deal with tradition and change, how do we film those translations of traditional mores into contemporary life and modes of existence, how do we make the invisible, visible? This is not a simple task.

Derek Walcott once admonished “if the old gods were dying in the mouths of the old they died of their own volition”. What do we do about “old gods” who are not necessarily old; their mores, strictures and worship are still an integral part of our daily lives. In particular how do we deal with them in the face of the fundamentalisms of every kind that have swept through our world in the latter part of the twentieth century? I am a Christian myself. Yet at the same time I can not, in all honesty, help but baulk at the ways in which fundamentalist faith is presented and/or deployed, sometimes almost as a deus-ex-machina, suddenly appearing at the end of a complex and intricate set of plot lines to make all things right by the easy solution of sprinkling a little scripture on top, when nothing at all in parts one two and three on the film has in any way given grounds for such a possibility as acceptable. So many of our films lack a satisfying sense of an ending.

We are dealing here, amongst other things, also with the quality of writing, not to say, of re-writing! If I may be forgiven, I would like here to quote Steven Spielberg. A year after the Academy of Motion pictures effectively turned its back on him, by nominating the Color Purple for 13 Oscars, and awarding it not a single one, he was given the Irving Thalberg award for his consistently high quality of motion picture production. He started his acceptance speech by talking about how he was a movie junkie, and then continued: That the whole idea of movie magic is that interweave of powerful image and dialogue and performance and music that can never be separated, and when it’s working right, can never be duplicated or ever forgotten. I’ve grown up—most of my life has been spent in the dark watching movies. Movies have been the literature of my life. The literature of Irving Thalberg’s generation was books and plays. They read the great words of great minds. And I think in our romance with technology and our excitement at exploring all the possibilities of film and video, I think we’ve partially lost something that we now have to reclaim. I think it’s time to renew our romance with the word. I’m as culpable as anyone in having exalted the image at the expense of the word. But only a generation of readers will spawn a generation of writers.

I confess, when I heard those words, literature teacher that I am, I stood alone in my living room and cheered. That short statement reminds us of a number of things that are crucially important here; that film is a collective art form dependent on co-operation; that it is an art form dependent on technologies of great possibility; and that in the end, it all begins with the writing.

Yet one other question we face is this very question of language: in which language do we make our films? Again this discussion goes far beyond the concerns of the film industry. In this respect, the film makes have a real edge over the writers, as proportionally there are far more films made in Yoruba, Igbo, Hausa, Akan or Ga etc than there are either books written, or films made in English.

This is important because I believe it helps account for the massive popularity of film as a medium, regardless of the challenges of the democracy of its art form. Yet in this regard there are also challenges regarding the quality and integrity of translations and sub-titles.

Yet no matter the language in which we write, we must deal with the stories we tell. Of these issues I would like to refer now not so much to the question of writing, but to the question first, of the language in which we write. Again this discussion goes far beyond the concerns of the film industry. This forum has been occasioned by a general concern about the way in which women are presented and the stories told about them. And there seems to be a kind of social malaise that has difficulty juggling the ideal and the real; at times we seem to have difficulty actually dealing with who we are, though perhaps the films do reflect a general social inability to deal with the world in which we live when it comes to the changing roles of women in society.

To illustrate with an anecdote from a class assignment: last year, in an undergraduate class on rights ethics and the rule of law, I gave an assignment to describe and discuss the power and authority structures in any small unit to which each student belonged, most of them chose the family unit. When they handed them in, in a class of 50 students, all but one of them who described the family launched into descriptions of the ideal patriarchal nuclear family where the father was the breadwinner and the mother stayed at home taking care of the children. But when I asked in the class, only ONE of them actually has a mother who stayed home full time as a housewife, all the others their mothers were in full or part-time employment. They were surrounded, at home and at school, by women in full-time employment, but seemed to have difficulty even articulating this, when it came up against some imagined sense of what a modern middle class family should look like, and this was a class in Accra, not in New Jersey. What place do women occupy in the cultural imagination? This may seem a trivial example, but for me, it makes me wonder about the continuum of social attitudes that ends up with women’s work being disregarded from the authority of the household to being factored into the statistics of national economies.

Yet we must acknowledge that there are changes being made. The question of a new future is the subject of our last panel, and there are some things we ask for which should not be too hard to accommodate; that the stories reflect our lives as lived a little more – for instance that female college students be seen a little more in classes and discussion courses and a little less in the beds of their lovers; that professional women be seen acting professionally in professional settings; that complex situations, including those involving conflict situations be presented without necessary demonization, and that the concerns with which we live be struggled with integrity.

Our lives, contemporary and historic, are food for story enough; we live through coups, countercoups and corruption. Beyond the drama of such incidents themselves, they take a toll on everyday life. Even in democratic peacetimes we pass through road blocks on our city streets on peaceful Sunday afternoons; we have to balance between snacks for our children or having their bus fare, we get sick, get well, loose our mothers, and we do all this without always being charged by circumstances to refer to demonic interferences. The place of women at the interface of tradition and modernity remains a vexed one. And we still have not fully grappled with what we call traditional cultures

The career of a film maker such as Tunde Kelani is evidence that it is not only women who can tackle these questions with courage. In his films women are bright, articulate, and face the dilemmas of our day, whether the legacies of ancient customs, or the consequences of contemporary social forces. Yet we must also support the growth of women in an industry which has traditionally limited their roles in front of the camera and severely restricted their roles behind it. Tough as the industry is for everyone involved in it, it is exponentially so for women who have a tougher time having access to all aspects of film making from the equipment to the financing. They are also, as some here will attest to, amongst those who are the most enterprising and risk taking in getting their work out.

I have concentrated here on fictional storytelling, but I would like here to acknowledge the work of women documentary film makers. African women living on the continent and in the Diaspora are amongst the most consistent and persistent in using that medium to challenge the ways in which are lives are framed on film. As with documentary films they are making popular films with messages targeted to general audiences for the transformation of society. The central issue remains: how hard is it to create an industry which projects the complexity of the way in which we our lives from a humane, ethical standpoint. These are the issues which confront us as women and men who support us, over the next two days.

Guinea Solidarity Mission-Executive Summary

Agenda – Solidarity Mission to Guinea

Since the draft constitution for Kenya was passed by Parliament paving the way for its publication and referendum, those seeking to stop the march towards a new dawn for Kenya have embarked on a mission of misinformation and misinterpretation of the draft constitution for selfish personal and fundamentalist interests.

A section of Christian leaders and the political class have latched on the legalization of abortion as one of the reasons why we should delay or forget about having a new constitution. Abortion is defined as partial or complete expulsion of products of conception before viability normally taken as 23 weeks from the last normal menstrual period. There are two types of abortion: spontaneous abortion referred to by lay people as miscarriage and elective or voluntary abortion.

In case they have not read the draft constitution carefully, Article 26 on the right to life states that: (1) every person has the right to life. (2) The life of a person begins at conception. (3) A person shall not be deprived of life intentionally, except to the extent authorised by this Constitution or other written law. (4) Abortion is not permitted unless, in the opinion of a trained health professional, there is need for emergency treatment, or the life or health of the mother is in danger, or if permitted by any other written law.

The clause above seeks to protect the life of all Kenyans regardless of their gender, religion or moral persuasion. Article 26 balances the interest of the church on one hand and women’s rights to life and respect for medical ethics and professionalism on the other. Taking care of the interests of different groups in society is the cornerstone of any constitution making process worth its salt. The minority should not suffer under the tyranny of the majority.

It is immoral to try and misinform Kenyans on this issue from the pulpits or public fora. A few men who have never and will never conceive should not purport to speak for and on behalf of the women of Kenya on an issue that they are inexperienced to discuss. Which Kenyans or women have they consulted? Women are citizens of this country and are entitled to all human rights including the right to life. Women constitute more than half of the Kenyan population and the church. Are the leaders telling us the lives of the majority of Kenyans who voted them into power and who finance and sustain the church are inconsequential?

Why are sections of the church and the political class hell bent on distorting facts in their personal quest to stop the country from getting a new constitution? Why are they trying to reduce our struggle for a new constitution to two non-contentious issues; kadhis courts and abortion? Why must their misinformed opinion prevail?

In their submissions to the CoE, women’s groups, lawyers and medical practitioners made it clear that a Constitution has no business delving into issues of abortion and should provide the general principle and leave abortion to be legislated through an act of parliament. They disagreed with the church’s assertion that is now in Article 26 (2) that ‘the life of a person begins at conception’. They questioned what is conception or when it occurs and expressed fear that this vague reference point may be used to criminalize certain effective and safe contraceptive methods. The church’s proposal prevailed.

Politicians and church leaders must be tolerant and understand that they cannot win all the time and that it does not hurt to accommodate other people’s views. They must emulate the humility of other interest groups; exercise tolerance, honesty and truthfully educate Kenyans on the provisions of the draft Constitution so that we can realise a new Constitution for this country.

The crafters of Article 26, listened to all interest groups on the right to life and came up with a provision that appreciates that there are instances when abortion does occur naturally or spontaneously which is referred to as miscarriage in layman’s language. In fact, 30 per cent of all clinically diagnosed pregnancies end in spontaneous abortion. It also seeks to acknowledge that medical conditions such as ectopic pregnancy, high blood pressure and others do not allow a woman to carry a pregnancy to term without resulting in maternal and foetal death and therefore doctors make a choice to preserve the life of the mother.

For those clamouring for the amendment of the Article 26 before or after the referendum, it may be useful to consider some sobering facts on abortion, women’s rights and the status of women in this country.

They need to appreciate that abortion is a universal practice: it occurs in all parts of the world—east and west, developed and developing, rich and poor—and among women of all types, single and married, sexually promiscuous and ‘celibate’, believers and non-believers, adolescent and older. Abortion is not a service procured by women only; men also force their wives, daughters and girlfriends to procure it.

They should note that no one in his or her right mind would say that it is fortunate to need a kidney or heart transplant. The same applies to abortion. Should need arise, it is very fortunate to be able to have a safe and legal one. That is why abortion is a medical procedure that doctors are taught and examined to make sure they are proficient in performing it before leaving medical school just like a tooth extraction, amputation of the leg or any other medical procedure. Therefore, it is a critical health service that should be made available to all Kenyan women and girls regardless of their economic status, religious or moral persuasion like any other medical or surgical procedures.

They should recognise the fact that voluntary abortion happens irrespective of whether laws making it legal or illegal exist. The only difference is that where laws restricting voluntary abortion exist, many women—especially those who are poor and cannot pay for safe procedures—end unwanted pregnancies themselves, or at the hands of unskilled personnel using unsafe methods. By doing so, they risk their health and even their lives. Legal status only affects the safety of abortion. In other words it makes safe abortion illegal and ‘unsafe abortion legal’ and sentences poor women and girls to unnecessary and preventable suffering and death.

Making voluntary abortion illegal does not save ‘babies’ it just kills and maims women and girls. Even though the current Kenya laws restrict voluntary abortion, 300, 000 abortions are performed annually. Furthermore, after procuring unsafe abortion many women and girls die which is a huge cost and loss to our economy. For the 21, 000 women who manage to get to health facilities with abortion complications each year, most post abortion care is provided in government health facilities, exacting a heavy toll on our under-resourced public health system.

Another consideration that is overlooked is that voluntary abortion reflects the unmet contraception and security needs of women and girls in the Kenyan society. Poor and young women in our country do not have easy access either to birth control, proper sex education or protection from sexual violence such as rape. Who is to judge that voluntary abortion for these Kenyan citizens is improper? Have we seen the church and political leaders marshal their troops in support of the Kenyan women’s call for an end to violence against women particularly rape and incest? The truth is, they have been silent.

Have some church and political leaders been at the forefront of campaigns opposing the use of contraceptives and introduction of sex education in schools? Have certain sections of the church been accused of sexually violating women and girls? For those who end up being pregnant, are they entitled to voluntary abortion? Is it moral to punish women for the failings of society or even the failings of their own judgment as human beings?

Have some sections of the church refused to baptise or admit in their schools children born out of wedlock because they have ‘no fathers’, their ‘parents are single’ or simply because they are ‘children of sin’? Have they excommunicated women who get pregnant before marriage? Do they pause to consider under what circumstances the children were conceived before discriminating against them and their mothers?

It is critical to appreciate that a woman with an unwanted pregnancy has three choices: to continue with the pregnancy with its risks and responsibilities, continue with the pregnancy and arrange for adoption or procure abortion with its risks and consequences. The key word here is CHOICE.

They also need to consider the known ways to reduce the health and human burden of unsafe abortion: to integrate sex education in the upper primary school curriculum, to increase the prevalence of contraceptive use to reduce overall levels of unintended pregnancy; to broaden the legal criteria under which abortion is permitted and establish services for the provision of safe, legal abortions within the law; and to provide women who experience complications from unsafe abortion with the medical treatment they need. They could borrow a leaf from Ethiopia, South Africa, Benin, Chad, Niger, Togo, Guinea and Mali who have amended their laws to provide for safe abortion resulting in considerable reduction in unsafe abortion and maternal mortality rates.

Abortion is morally right because a woman should not be forced to use her body to bear a child against her will. The universal moral justification would be that no one should be forced to use his or her body for the benefit of someone else. The real moral outrage should be that a section of our society with selfish personal and fundamentalist religious and political interests is preventing a majority of Kenyans from enjoying a very critical service-abortion. Lets us vote YES and later amend Article 26, not to make abortion illegal, but to make it explicitly legal and available on demand. That is the only way to ensure that all Kenyan women and girls enjoy their fundamental rights to life and health.

Mary Wandia

mwandia@yahoo.com

The author works on gender justice and governance.

The African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) was represented at the 54^th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) between 27^th February and 7^th March by:

Dr Hilda Tadria – Board Chair

Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi – Executive Director

Sarah Mukasa – Director of Programmes

Roselynn Musa – Programme Officer (Information & Documentation)

Nana Sekyiamah – Programme Officer (Fundraising & Communications)

AWDF also supported a number of African women’s rights organisations to participate in the CSW. These included:

• ABANTU for Development (Ghana)
• FIDA Ghana
• Young Women’s Christian Association (Zimbabwe)
• Inter-African Committee on Traditional Practices (IAC)
• Nigeria Gender Budget Network (NGBN)
• Women’s Consortium of Nigeria
• Network for Women’s Rights in Ghana (NETRIGHT)

Supporting African women’s rights organisations to attend international conferences and convenings is part of AWDF’s remit to promote learning and the sharing of experiences on a local, national and international level.

Highlights of AWDF’s Activities

The New York Launch of Voice, Power and Soul: Portraits of African Feminists

On the 1^st of March 2010, Hon Gertrude Moneglla , the first President of the Pan-African Parliament and Jessica Horn, co-editor of Voice, Power and Soul: Portraits of African Feminists with Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi, Executive Director of AWDF launched Voice, Power and Soul: Portraits of African Feminists at the African Women’s Caucus which took place at the UN Church Centre, New York. Hon Mongella expressed her congratulations on the production of a document that presents an alternative and affirming image of African women. ‘I am happy to launch a book that does not portray African women as starving, helpless, hopeless and suffering. Instead we see strong, happy and resourceful women. And we also see more young women doing positive things. I am very happy about this. It sends a very important message.’

AWDF’s Participation in the African Women’s Caucus

Also launched at the African Women’s Caucus on 1^st March, was the African Women’s Regional Shadow Report on Beijing +15, a consultative document produced by The African Women’s Development and Communications Network (FEMNET) with financial support from AWDF. The report highlighted the key achievements and challenges in implementing the Beijing Platform of Action. In her remarks on the report, AWDF’s Executive Director, Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi that progress in achieving the benchmarks could be summarized under four key areas, those of Celebration Hope, Urgency, and Despair. Bisi pointed out that although there were areas in which African women could celebrate, such as women’s advancement in political spaces in countries such as Liberia and Rwanda there were also other areas such as the continuous conflicts in many parts of the continent that leads one to despair. Bisi however expressed hope in the vibrancy of the African women’s movement to continue to deal with the pressing issues facing the continent.

The African Protocol on the Rights of Women

Roselynn Musa, AWDF’s Programme Officer for Information & Documentation provided an evaluation of the Implementation of the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa (SEDGA) on behalf of the ‘Solidarity for African Women’s Rights Coalition’ (SOAWR). In her assessment Roselynn named 4 gaps in the process of implementation of the SDGEA including a lack of commitment by nations to submit annual reports on progress made in taking account of gender particularities, a lack of political will, a lack of understanding and knowledge about the content of SDGEA and a lack of cooperation between institutions in order to expose threats/abuses and document cases prosecuted.

Centre for Women’s Global Leadership’s 20^th Anniversary Symposium

AWDF’s Executive Director, Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi was one of the keynote speakers who shared her thoughts on movement building and the importance of sustainability for movement building work. In her address Bisi identified three key challenges facing the women’s movement today, which are a lack of alignment between vision, values and practice, a lack of appropriate leadership with some institutions and a sustainability challenge – some women’s organizations exist on shoestring budgets. In her recommendations, Bisi stressed the importance of re-dedication to global movements, and to feminist values and goals. She highlighted the need to make movements more inclusive and incorporate women who may not be part of formal organizations. This could be done by organizing regional spaces where feminists can convene regardless of organisational affiliation, as has been done in the case of the African Feminist Forum (AFF).

NEPAD/Spanish Fund Panel

Sarah Mukasa, AWDF’s Director of Programmes shared details of what AWDF has been able to achieve with support from the NEPAD/Spanish Fund. Support from the NEPAD/Spanish Fund enabled AWDF to scale up grant-making to support African women in the area of Economic Empowerment. Grants were disbursed to 52 women’s organisations in 9 countries, this funding was provided to scale up income generating activities, to increase vocational skills training and to invest in capital resources. As a result of this additional support the income generation activities of groups funded was strengthened and the provision of vocation skills training enabled women to make choices around which income generation activities they would participate in to support themselves and their families. An important outcome was that AWDF also strengthened its own capacities to respond to the needs of its constituents. The impact of this funding has been at a personal and community level – women been able to raise the visibility of their contributions, and have been able to raise their voices within their communities around what their specific needs are. This funding has resulted in a sustainable resource base for women and their families. Sarah however stressed that this should be seen as a beginning rather than an end.

The first ever African Women’s Economic Summit was held at the Windsor Hotel, in Nairobi, Kenya from March 18-20, 2010. The Summit was jointly organized by the New Faces & Voices Network (NFVN) and the African Development Bank (AfDB). This initiative brought together African and global leaders, majority of who were women who could influence and effect changes within their respective institutions. And who collectively could influence change through different strategies to bring women in Africa to centre stage, assuming key positions and contributing to the decisions that shape the African continent and a new global financial system.

Participants were drawn from financial services providers, regulatory bodies, development finance institutions, think tanks and advocacy groups, women’s right activist organisations, business and professional organizations, prominent business men and women and government leaders.

The Summit had the following objectives:

• Identify the opportunities and challenges to expand women’s access to financial products and services, and to advance women within the management and leadership structures of financial sector institutions
• Expand innovations to massively expand the amount of finance and scale of outreach of financial services and capital to women, as retail consumers of finance and as owners of businesses.
• Identify measures that will ensure women take their rightful place as decision makers within the governance and management structures of national, regional, continental and global financial institutions.
• Collectively identify the leadership needed to introduce new ways of thinking, and the actions required to build an African financial system that is more inclusive of women

Prominent speakers at the Summit include Hon. Uhuru Kenyatta, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance of the Republic of Kenya, Ms Speciosa Kazibwe Wandira, former vice-president of Uganda, Dr. Luisa Diogo, former Prime Minister of Mozambique, Prof. Njuguna Ndung’u, Governor of the Central Bank of Kenya, Ms Linah Mohohlo, Governor of the Central bank of Botswana, Dr. Mamphela Ramphele, a former managing Director of the World Bank, Prof. Wangari Maathai, Nobel Laureate and Founder of the Greenbelt Movement, Mr. Arnold Ekpe, Grouyp CEO, Ecobank, Togo and Charles Abugre, Deputy Director for Africa, UN Millennium Campaign.

The two-day Summit was organised in a practical and participatory manner, encouraged honest discussions between the diverse interest groups present. This highlighted practical experiences and challenges of women in assessing various forms of finances at different levels. It also allowed for responses from policy and decision makers on strategies and commitments that could ensure acceptable access to financial services by women of all categories.

The Summit was very insightful and educative for me, it did not just touch on increasing or making financial services accessible to women, but it also went deep to explore women’s access to finance and decision making positions and its implication on the social structures at the community and household levels. It discussed the cultural and family implications for women in higher decision making positions. This included the ability to detach ourselves from cultural barriers, having fewer prejudices and courage to refuse to pander to stereotypes for example. By the end of the second day these conclusions among others were clearly defined:

• That women should form the centre stage of the financial sector because women bring talent, energy and creativity to the table, women are both policy makers and consumers of financial products and services.
• The need for accessibility to higher education among women; an appropriate level of ethics; and the use of advocacy and activism to improve the visibility of women’s cause.
• The need to have more reliable and prudential regulations in place that are gender sensitive and responsive to women’s needs.
• That while land ownership is crucial for women in many part of the continent, it should not become a limiting factor for women to access financial services. Instead it is important for women to diversify their asset base-one that is dynamic and consists of knowledge, excellence and networks.

So many profound statements were made, very inspirational and action oriented but one that has stayed with me for some time now was made by Donald Kaberuka, president of African Development Bank Group; where he acknowledged the benefits of improving women’s economic opportunities by saying ‘it’s a way to enhance women’s contributions to the growth of our economies and the well-being of our communities”. And that he strongly believes that “investing in women differently is essential to revitalise our economies”. I was not surprised when he put forward a wish list including access to finance, infrastructure, a skilled workforce, and a stable continent without episodic instabilities as the requirements for women to prosper in business.

Moving forward, l hope the energies, rich action plan and commitments will be followed through and the ideals of the economic summit sustained for future generations. I look forward to collectively supporting the agenda of the summit in its future activities.

The New Faces & Voices Network (NFVN) is an association of African leaders in business and finance across the continent that was established under the patronage of the African Women’s Foresight Network and was founded by Madam Graca Machel. The Network is committed to dynamically engaging the relevant institutions to create opportunities for women to contribute to the decisions that shape the African continent.

By: Nafi Chinery

Capacity Building Officer (AWDF)

The New York Launch of ‘Voice, Power and Soul: Portraits of African Feminists’ took place at the UN Church Centre as part of activities marking the 54th session of the Commission on the Status of Women. The book was officially launched by Gertrude Mongella, the first President of the African Parliament with co-editor Jessica Horn

The African Women’s Decade (2010- 2020) to be launched regionally in October 2010, would coincide with the time that the women’s movement worldwide is marking significant landmarks on gender equality and the empowerment of women. This year, the world is reviewing thirty years of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Again Women (CEDAW), fifteen years of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (BPfA), ten years of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325, six years of the adoption of the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa (SDGEA), and five years since the coming into force of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, just to mention, but a few. A pointer to the fact that as far as women’s rights in Africa are concerned, we have reached a stage where implementation has to be given greater attention.

The Africa review of the Beijing Platform for Action (Beijing +15), which took place in Banjul in November 2009 paints a grim picture of African countries not meeting their commitments on gender equality. The decade presents a new chance for taking women’s rights in Africa to a higher level. One of the first and important steps should be to advocate for the implementation of the mechanisms that our governments have committed to. It is evident that we will make much progress without a framework that highlights what progress if any we are making towards transforming the lives of African women for the better. Advocacy should be accompanied by monitoring progress at different phases of the decade.

Adequate financial and technical resources are very crucial to making dreams come true, therefore approval for setting up a Women’s Trust Fund for African women (as agreed by the Heads of State of the AU under the SDGEA), could not have come at a better time. For the African Women’s decade to succeed the African Women’s Trust Fund should become operational without any further delay. In addition, the gender machineries at the country level, which are mandated with the responsibility of promoting gender equality, should be very well resourced by their governments so that they can carry out their mandates successfully.

Central to these is the need for women to tell their stories themselves. Experience sharing and dissemination of information on good practices would go a long way to avoid duplication. A tracking system to monitor and report on the achievements and progress with regard to the expected output should be developed and shared at the on set for both progress monitoring and evaluation at the end of the decade.

Ten years may give the illusion of a long time, but the reality is that time flies. Before one knows it the decade would have come and gone. It is my sincere hope that at the end of the historic African Women’s Decade we would all look back with pride, congratulate and pat ourselves on the back for having made the best use of this unique opportunity. We should hit the ground running.

Roselynn Musa

Programme Officer (Information & Documentation)

IMMEDIATE PRESS RELEASE

10th February 2010

The Launch of the African Women’s Development Fund’s Resource Centre

On the 10^th of February, 2010, The African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) with support from The African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) will launch a resource facility for African Women at AWDF House, 78 Ambassadorial Enclave, East Legon, Accra, Ghana.

The establishment of AWDF’s Resource Centre is part of AWDF’s efforts to meet key strategic objectives including:

• To contribute towards building a body of knowledge on gender and development
• To showcase the contributions that African women have made to development in Africa
• To enhance AWDF’s documentation and information dissemination capacity
• To support capacity building initiatives which encourage good practice in NGO leadership and management, learning, networking, partnerships and collaborations

AWDF’s Resource Centre is well equipped with a range of literature particularly suited to women working in the non-governmental sector and women looking to enhance their personal/professional development. According to AWDF’s Executive Director Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi:

“It’s about time African Women have a Resource Centre where women can go to learn, read and develop themselves. A centre where women can meet, share knowledge with one another and network. As part of its capacity building efforts, AWDF is pleased to be able to provide such a space for African women”

ENDS

About AWDF

The African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) is a grant-making foundation, which supports local, national and regional organizations in Africa working towards women’s empowerment. AWDF through institutional capacity building and program development seeks to build a culture of learning and partnerships within the African women’s movement.

The vision of AWDF is for African women to live in a world in which there is social justice, equality and respect for women’s human rights. To this end, our mission is to mobilize financial resources to support local, national and regional initiatives led by women, which will lead to the achievement of this vision.

Press Enquiries

Nana Sekyiamah – Programme Officer (Fundraising & Communications)

African Women’s Development Fund

Plot 78, Ambassadorial Enclave, East Legon, Accra

Tel: + 233 21 521257

Fax: +233 21 521257

Email: nana@africlub.net/awdf

Website: www.africlub.net/awdf