Ministry lauded for promoting country’s gender agenda
Some gender-based Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and donor communities have commended the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection (MoGCSP) for its role in promoting the country’s gender agenda.
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They, however, called on the ministry to do more in the areas of stigmatisation of women with HIV and AIDs, prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT), stigmatisation of adolescents in witches camps, as well as push for the passage of the Affirmative Action bill, the Property Rights of Spouses bill and the Interestate Succession bill.
At the mid-term review of Ghana’s gender agenda in Accra on Tuesday, representatives from gender-based organisations and donor partners, in their various submissions, called on the ministry to put in more efforts to achieve gender parity in the areas of education, politics and public service.
Pledge of support
According to them, they are so far impressed with the work of the ministry over the last few years and commended especially the sector minister, Nana Oye Lithur, for her role in gender equality.
They pledged their support and commitment to the ministry to help push the country’s gender agenda forward.
They expressed another view that the ministry should spearhead the participation of more women in the 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections to ensure that more women participated and were elected in the elections.
Giving an account of the ministry’s performance from February 2013 to October 2015, Nana Oye said based on the development agenda of the Ghana Shared Growth and Development Agenda (GGDA II) the dividends of growth must “benefit all Ghanaians, irrespective of gender, location, socio-economic and physical status”.
As a result, she said the ministry had since 2013 worked to incorporate gender issues into the national development agenda.
Ghana’s gender agenda
The work of the ministry in promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment had been guided by various national, regional and international frameworks.
She said the 1992 Constitution guaranteed gender equality and freedom of women, men, girls and boys from any act of discrimination on the basis of social, economic or any other reasons.
The Constitution, she said, provided that the “State shall afford equality of economic opportunity to all citizens; and, in particular, the State shall take all necessary steps so as to ensure the full integration of women into the mainstream of the economic development of Ghana”
Policy objectives
To ensure that the ministry worked within its mandate, she said it had adopted some policy objectives for its operations which included developing a comprehensive social-development policy framework, promote the effective integration of gender consideration at all stages and in all dimension of data production and creation of statistical knowledge, make social protection more effective targeting the poor and the vulnerable, promote gender equity in political, social and economic development systems and outcomes and also enhance funding and cost effectiveness in social protection delivery, among others.
International agenda
Nana Oye said the ministry’s objective was to implement programmes that would promote gender equity in political, social and economic-development systems and outcomes and with the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) established in 2000 and operated to this year, the ministry worked to incorporate each of the goals in all programmes and policies.
The ministry, she said, further relied on its international commitments in working to address issues of gender inequality and women’s empowerment with conventions such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Elimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the Beijing Platform of Action and Review for Beijing +20, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa and the African Platform for Action, among others.
The West Africa Regional Office Director of ABANTU for Development, Dr Mrs Rose Mensah-Kutin, who chaired the forum, said the ministry’s mid-term review resonated with both the global and regional agenda as they placed emphasis on how gender equality, empowerment of women, women’s human rights and the eradication of poverty were essential to economic and social development.
Representatives of CSOs and the donor communities made presentations on the role of the ministry in promoting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), among other projects.
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