PANELLISTS at a public forum on women advocacy have called for moral, material and financial support for women to take up responsible positions to enable them to take part in decisions that would advance their welfare.
This, according to the panellists, has become necessary due to the limited number of women in responsible positions, particularly in politics although they formed the majority of the country’s population.
The forum, which was organised at Koforidua by Abantu, a gender advocacy organisation, and attended by a cross-section of society, brought together resource persons namely Mrs Hamida Harrison, a lecturer of the University of Ghana, Legon; Mrs Roseline Obeng Ofori, a gender consultant; and Mr Emmanuel Quaye-Sowah, the Eastern Regional Director of the National Commission on Civic Education, who took turns to call for support for women to take up top positions in society, especially politics.
That, according to the panellists, would enable them to take part in decisions that would advance their development. Mrs Harrison, who set the ball rolling, expressed regrets that although Ghanaian women constituted 51 per cent of the country’s population only a few of them were in decision-making positions and attributed such an unfortunate situation to a number of factors that should be addressed.
The factors, according to her, were low rate of illiteracy, poverty, discrimination, socio-cultural subordination that had deprived them from owning property such as land, and heavy domestic duty such as child-bearing and care which normally take most of their time to the advantage of men.
She said these problems, which had confronted women for ages, had, however, been brought to the fore through the initiative of the United Nations (UN), which organised a number of international meetings such as the 1980 Copenhagen and the 1985 Beijing conferences to advance the cause of women.
Mrs Harrison — who indicated that the governments of various countries, especially Ghana had, in accordance to the dictates of the UN, taken steps to address the factors militating against women and had appointed some women to top positions — expressed the hope that more of such appointments would be forthcoming to enable women to take part in the decision-making process in all the socio-economic as well as political sectors.
Mrs Rosaline Obeng Ofori for her part said since Ghanaian women were considered as the pillar of the family, the nucleus of society, it would be absurd to relegate them to the background in decision-making.
She said although women and men had the same capabilities, most often women with good characters could not get to top positions, particularly in politics due to poverty as a result of which rich men with dubious characters managed to use their wealth to ascend to such high positions only to mess up in the process.
Mrs Obeng Ofori therefore called on the people to throw their lot behind women so that they would be able to improve their lot and society in general.
When it came to his turn, Mr Quaye-Sowah, who spoke mainly on how to make the December elections violence-free, called on journalists, security personnel and politicians to be circumspect in their activities to make the event a peaceful one.
That, he said, would preserve the country’s’ democracy for succeeding generations.
Earlier in her welcoming address, the Programme Officer of Abantu, Ms Matilda Odei, had said her outfit would continue to agitate for the improvement of the lot of Ghanaian women to enable them to take part in decisions that affect them.
A member of the Steering Committee on the Women Manifesto Coalition, Miss Adwoa Sakyi, who chaired the function, commended Ghanaian women who in spite of a lot of difficulties were able to occupy top positions in society.
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