Media urged to promote women’s participation in leadership

A two-day media forum organised by the Women, Peace and Security Institute (WPSI) has ended in Accra with a call on the media, Government and other stakeholders to be solution seekers to women’s participation in leadership and peace issues.

The forum also said competency, personal ability, expertise and experience, should be the determining factors in considering people for leadership roles, and not gender.

Ms C. Pat Alsup, Deputy Chief of Mission, Embassy of the United States of America (USA), made the call last Tuesday at the opening ceremony of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC) Women, Peace and Security Institute (WPSI) Media Forum, in Accra.

She said the media, which was an important piece to the solution of empowering women had a role in promoting women to be actors and stabilisers.

She said after some 14 years of the passage of the United Nation’s Security Council Resolution (UNSCR)1325, more than 35 per cent out of approximately 125,000 peacekeepers are women, participating fully in peacekeeping operations.

   “We recognise and salute Ghana for being one of the top five nations contributing female uniformed personnel in peacekeeping operations, with a total of 167 female soldiers from the Ghana Armed Forces and 85 police officers,” she said.

 UNSCR 1325

UNSCR 1325 is a landmark international legal framework that addresses not only the ordinate impact of war on women, but also the pivotal role women should play in conflict management, conflict resolution and sustainable peace.    

She also commended Ghana for formulating a National Action Plan for the implementation of UNSCR 1325.    

Ms Alsup however said, there was much work to be done in achieving gender equality both domestically and internationally and called for collaboration among all, especially the media and related agencies and organisation, in ensuring the effective implementation of policies and laws that promote the rights of  women. 

“As half of those who bear the brunt of war and conflict, women also play a vital role in creating and maintaining conditions for stability and peace,” she added.

Explaining the rationale behind the engagement with journalists, Major General Obed Akwa, Commandant of KAIPTC, said the forum, which was on the theme, “Partnering with the Media to Promote the Full Implementation of the UNSCR 1325 and Women’s Greater Participation in Governance and Peace Processes,” aimed at providing opportunity for the media to reflect on its role in raising awareness and monitoring the implementation of UNSCR 1325 and related women, peace and security resolutions.

He said the forum also sought to draw attention to the persistent gap between policy and action with regard to the role and contributions of women to peace processes and their representation in leadership.

He said although there had been some level of improvement in the lives of women since the adoption of the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women and the Beijing platform for Action, the level of women’s participation in peace processes had remained low.

 “Their representation and visibility at the upper reaches of state institutions, including the security services, have also remained low,” he added.

Strategies by stakeholders

He, therefore, called on all stakeholders to come out with strategies that would promote vibrant partnership between them and the media, to promote the women, peace and security agenda, which is also fundamental to the attainment and consolidation of lasting peace.

Dr Izeduwa Derex-Briggs, Country Representative of UNWOMEN, South Sudan, observed that women issues needed to be at the centre of all policy formulation and called for a concerted effort among all stakeholders to efficiently help promote women issues and their  rights, since they constituted  an essential commodity for a country’s development.

She tasked journalists to treat stories concerning women with the needed attention and also see them as equal partners playing the good roles of helping to promote people’s rights, especially, that of children.

The participants called for collaborative and pragmatic measures among KAIPTC, WPSI, Government, institutions and all stakeholders to help curb injustices against women and encourage them to take up leadership roles.  — GNA