At least 60 organisations and individuals convening for Southern African Development Community (SADC) in South Africa would push for adoption of a draft protocol on Gender and Development.
A week long Summit due next week which is coinciding with South Africa’s women’s month, is expected to put women on top of the agenda, with SA President Thabo Mbeki playing a leading role to showcase SA’s progressive stance on gender equality.

Gender activists around the region are also said to be busy making final moves to lobby for what could be successful culmination of a campaign launched in 2005 to see a legally binding Protocol on Gender and Development approved by Southern African leaders.

Although SADC has made strides to address women’s rights concerns ranging from gender policies to gender sensitive legislation, SADC member’s states are far from realizing equality between women and men at many levels, gender activists have said.

Women’s organizations said new forms of abuse are emerging with surge in human trafficking apart from the longstanding brutalities of domestic violence and widespread sexual assaults, saying women remain the poorest of the poor, as hunger and food insecurity hit women and children the hardest, while the number of women in leadership positions at all levels remains unreasonably low.

Although there are a number of regional and national commitments to addressing gender issues, policies and laws on paper are not enough, there is need to shift toward delivery to make them work for women.

Once adopted, Gender Protocol would make it necessary for all forms of regional cooperation to take gender on board in all processes supporting development, democracy and human rights in the region.

Moreover, the Protocol would require states to not only report on progress periodically, but also places issues at the center of regional cooperation agenda.

The anxious wait by activists is understandable. Not only is the Protocol an important step for equality in the region, but it also represents tremendous efforts of people of the region. At least seven drafts have been negotiated at senior technical and political levels by SADC governments, text removed and reincorporated, and issues agreed and disagreed upon.

Region is a step closer towards adoption after recent review of the draft by SADC Ministers of Justice in Lusaka, end of June 2008. Yet, perhaps uppermost in most gender activists’ minds is whether, after its deferment last year at the Lusaka SADC Summit.

In order to minimize possibility of another deferment, women’s organizations have been elevating their game, implementing pro-active political strategies at national and regional levels. One of the more visible lobby coalitions, the Southern Africa Gender Protocol Alliance, has been leading this process.

Summit host, South Africa, have a relatively good record of addressing issues that matter to women, and, is in fact a regional leader in ensuring women’s representation in decision making. It thus has direct influence in the outcome of this gender equality agenda during the SADC Summit. Will it deliver? A question has been left hanging, with gender activists saying adoption of Gender Protocol at Summit this month would surely represent this region’s finest hour.

After a few months of not blogging (due to a busy business traveling schedule), I am compelled to talk about a publication that was released by International Women’s Tribune Center in August 2006 called “UN Reform: What’s in it for Women?”. This book features reflections, insights and analysis by women from different regions specifically examining the impact of the UN reform process on women at the regional and national levels. It also presents different initiatives and proposals in ensuring women’s spaces within the UN as well as concrete recommendations on how to influence the UN reform process.
My first question when I saw this publication (as many of you may think the same way), what difference does this publication make especially in this world when UN policies don’t even matter in many countries’ domestic and foreign policies ? For many of us it seems that we hear of many atrocities that women, especially in the developing world, are enduring, but the world keeps watching.
However, despite all of this, the publication had some compelling statistics that most of us would be interested in knowing…
• over half of the world’s poor are women;
• up to 600,000 women die yearly in childbirth;
• up to 3 million women die each year as a result of gender-based violence or neglect;
• women account for almost half of all HIV/AIDS cases worldwide and up to 70 percent of cases in sub-Saharan Africa;
• a s many as 4 million girls and women a year are sold into prostitution;
• women are educationally short changed, with two thirds of the world’s 876 million illiterates being female; and
• women are more insecure in the working world – generally unemployed longer and more frequently than men and employed for lower wages.

The light at the end of the tunnel is that women activists who consider the UN as an important site of struggle are concerned that the political gains at the global level with respect to social justice, women’s rights and gender equality are eroding. At present a number of proposals on how to address this problem are being hotly debated – one proposal being the creation of a new women’s agency.
Aluta Continua!

Members of the Southern African Gender Protocol Alliance have called on all those involved in preparations for the Heads of State Summit in August 2008 to put forward a stronger draft of the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development. In a statement, the Alliance said that while significant advances have been made in strengthening the watered down draft that Heads of State sent back for further consultation in 2007, the current draft is “strong on development; weak on rights that women have gained through successive processes culminating in the African Charter of Human and Peoples Rights. “ Key issues raised include:
· Some of the pertinent and core issues addressed in the SADC Gender Declaration and Addendum, have been eliminated from the current draft.
· In a number of instances the Protocol has watered down obligatory language like “ensure” to “endeavour”, even where there are existing firm commitments; for example to achieving 50% representation of women in decision making by 2015.
· Whilst the current draft cross-references key provisions with existing SADC Protocols many of these are themselves gender blind (for example education; HIV and AIDS; media and information). There is need for the critical gender issues in these sectors to be drawn out in the Protocol
· The draft does not address the issue regarding the rights of cohabiting couples. We note that national consultations in various countries have identified this as a growing trend and a critical gender issue. Gross violations, in particular children’s rights and the property rights of women are occurring daily with little or no legal protection. This is a critical gap that can no longer be ignored, in view of some credible studies that have been carried out indicating that the family has changed in SADC, and the need for policy and legislation to respond to this change.
· It is necessary to clearly articulate women’s sexual and reproductive rights in the draft in order to enhance their promotion and protection as already encapsulated in the AU Protocol. The current draft is weak in this regard, for example, it does not address the right of women to control their fertility, their rights to decide on whether to have children, the number and their spacing, the right to choose any method of contraception, and the right to self protection against STIs, including HIV and AIDS.
· The definition of rights must extend to the rights of vulnerable and marginalized groups. This is absent from the current draft and needs to be explicit, otherwise this leaves a gap in the draft. Specific proposals can be accessed at: http://www.genderlinks.org.za/attachment_view.php?pa_id=529

In a report by the Catholic Information Service for Africa (reported in March , 2008); efforts to meet international development goals must focus on empowering women, Deputy UN Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro said in a speech delivered at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.“Empowering women is not just an end in itself; it is a prerequisite for reaching all of the Millennium Development Goals our common vision to build a better world in the 21st century,” she said of the targets, known as MDGs, that aim to slash a host of global ills by 2015.At the moment, the news is quite sobering, she said: systematic discrimination against girls and women in the world’s poorest countries will make it impossible for these states to meet the priority goal to halve the number of people living in extreme poverty by that year.“Women and girls form the majority of the world’s poor and hungry; girls are dropping out of primary school at rates far greater than boys, and the spread of HIV disproportionately affects women and girls,” Ms. Migiro said, adding that efforts to cut maternal mortality rates were also lagging.As national legal structures were still not adequately addressing this situation, women’s leadership was crucial, she said.In that context, the Deputy Secretary-General noted that MDG number three; promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment, recognized this by including an indicator for women’s political leadership.To achieve this, it was crucial to promote affirmative action, human rights protection and leadership training, including apprenticeship programmes for young women in political parties, as well as programmes to develop a “women’s manifesto of policy priorities. In addition, she said, it was imperative to boost women’s economic leadership and to protect women against violence.

Members of the Southern African Gender Protocol Alliance have called on all those involved in preparations for the Heads of State Summit in August 2008 to put forward a stronger draft of the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development. In a statement, the Alliance said that while significant advances have been made in strengthening the watered down draft that Heads of State sent back for further consultation in 2007, the current draft is “strong on development; weak on rights that women have gained through successive processes culminating in the African Charter of Human and Peoples Rights. “ Key issues raised include:
· Some of the pertinent and core issues addressed in the SADC Gender Declaration and Addendum, have been eliminated from the current draft.
· In a number of instances the Protocol has watered down obligatory language like “ensure” to “endeavour”, even where there are existing firm commitments; for example to achieving 50% representation of women in decision making by 2015.
· Whilst the current draft cross-references key provisions with existing SADC Protocols many of these are themselves gender blind (for example education; HIV and AIDS; media and information)
. There is need for the critical gender issues in these sectors to be drawn out in the Protocol
· The draft does not address the issue regarding the rights of cohabiting couples. We note that national consultations in various countries have identified this as a growing trend and a critical gender issue. Gross violations, in particular children’s rights and the property rights of women are occurring daily with little or no legal protection. This is a critical gap that can no longer be ignored, in view of some credible studies that have been carried out indicating that the family has changed in SADC, and the need for policy and legislation to respond to this change.
· It is necessary to clearly articulate women’s sexual and reproductive rights in the draft in order to enhance their promotion and protection as already encapsulated in the AU Protocol. The current draft is weak in this regard, for example, it does not address the right of women to control their fertility, their rights to decide on whether to have children, the number and their spacing, the right to choose any method of contraception, and the right to self protection against STIs, including HIV and AIDS.
· The definition of rights must extend to the rights of vulnerable and marginalized groups. This is absent from the current draft and needs to be explicit, otherwise this leaves a gap in the draft. Specific proposals can be accessed at http://www.genderlinks.org.za/attachment_view.php?pa_id=529

As a Zimbabwean native, it is with much relief that President Mugabe and his bitter foe, the opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, on June 22, 2008, signed a deal outlining a framework for talks on the country’s political crisis. The two men shook hands for the first time in a decade at a brief, stiff ceremony in the capital, Harare. The memorandum of understanding, brokered by President Mbeki of South Africa, commits all parties to “establishing the framework of an inclusive government”. It also commits Mr Mugabe to ending political violence, ensuring the law is applied equally and guaranteeing the safe return of tens of thousands of people who fled their homes during the last three months of violence. Mr Mugabe is also obliged to lift the ban, imposed on June 5, preventing aid agencies from helping thousands of internal refugees and a population about to be consumed by famine. Hundreds of refugees have been denied medical attention for injuries inflicted by government soldiers and police. Regional commentators sayt hat the deal could signal the end for Mr Mugabe, who has governed Zimbabwe since it gained independence in 1980.
We shall see …

Two years ago, a petite 13 year old girl named Hadjo Garbo, was married to one of the older men in her village in the Dosso region of southwest Niger. By age 14, she was pregnant with her first child. But before her 15th birthday she had lost the baby - and her husband.

Hadjo’s body was not ready to deliver a baby and so after an excruciating three-day labor, the unborn fetus was cut out of her, stillborn.

The horrific labor left the girl with what gynecologists call an obstetric fistula, a tearing of the tissue that develops when blood supply to the tissues of the vagina and bladder and/or rectum is cut off during prolonged obstructed labor. The condition mostly affects child victims of underage marriage.

Hadjo was ostracised by her husband and his family, and forced to secrete herself away from the prying eyes and laughter of her former school friends.

In many Western and Muslim countries what happened to Hadjo would be called pedophilia and the male attacker would be arrested and imprisoned. In Niger that word is only applied to men who have sex with girls outside of marriage – pedophilia is only talked about if sex happens outside marriage.

From the biological, physiological point of view, it’s clear that at nine, 10, 11 or 12 years old a girl simply is not ready for sex and child bearing. That’s the reality, but it is hard to make our communities understand. The effects can be long-lasting and extend beyond physical health, human rights workers and psychologists who have studied child brides say.

Forced sexual intercourse, denial of freedom and domestic violence are “frequently” found in child marriages, the long-term effects of which are poorly understood, according to a confidential NGO study shown to IRIN.

Eventually, the girls are likely to be abandoned when their polygamous husbands take another young bride. In Niger, women have little or no rights after a divorce.

Hadjo’s case is not an isolated one in Niger. The problem affects all the regions of the country, Djibrilla said. At least a third of girls are married by the age of 15, and 75 percent before the age of 18, according to the UN Population Fund (UNFPA).

In reality, activists say 13 is a common age for marriage, and some girls are married off as young as nine or 10.

They will be forced to have sex even before their first period.

Negotiations over the Family Code (Code de la Personne et de la Famille) - a piece of domestic legislation which would have defined the legal relationship between husbands and wives and children and parents, and included a legal minimum age for marriage and sexual intercourse - collapsed in 2006.

UNFPA wants the age of marriage to be changed to 18. It says that would give girls longer in school, give their bodies time to develop, and allow them to reach adulthood. It would also help curb Niger’s runaway demographic growth by reducing a girl’s reproductive lifespan.

Keeping girls in school has wider benefits, according to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF). In a 2001 study, the agency found that women with seven or more years of education marry an average of four years later and have 2.2 fewer children than those with no education.

In Niger, only 15 percent of adult women are literate, and less than one-third of girls enrol in primary school.

There are also economic reasons behind early marriages; there is the chance that the girl will go to a better home or just that the marriage will be celebrated with a good party and food.

Hadjo’s story does at least have a somewhat happy ending. She underwent two operations for the fistula and spent 12 months at a recovery centre in Niamey, and is ready to go home again.

Hadjo’s husband abandoned her. Her father, a peasant farmer, insists that even if he were still around she would not be going back to him.

However, she will not be able to have any more children, a grave condition in a country where women’s fertility is prized. Unlikely to be able to remarry and without having completed her education, her future might yet turn out to be just as difficult as her past.

On April 15 the World Bank President raised concern about a surge in food prices, fearing it could push 100 million people into deeper poverty. Most of the affected populations live in Africa where protests against rising cost of living have been held in some countries, including Senegal, Cameroon and Tunisia.
However, all is not doom and gloom for the continent. On average, African economies are expected to record 6.2% growth in 2008, the annual Economic Report on Africa [ERA 2008] confirms, amid concerns in laxity of the fight against extreme poverty and international support for development. The annual report of the UN Commission for Africa and the African Union attributed the growth to the robust demand and high commodity prices. The growth forecast growth is also linked to consolidation of macroeconomic stability and improved management, greater commitment to economic reforms, increased private capital flows, debt relief and increasing non-fuel exports. Growth performance varies sharply across countries and regions, the report said.

A decline in political conflicts and wars on the continent, particularly in west and central Africa and growth, was taken into recognition by the report.

However, Africa’s growth in 2008 will be seriously challenged by the sharp slowdown of the US economy, a fall in global commodity demand and prices and hike oil prices.

Growth is also expected to be risked by political instability in some countries, inefficient public infrastructure, erratic energy supply and poor integration of transportation, among others.

March is Women’s History Month. All over the world, March 8th honors International Women’s Day, a day that commemorates the struggles of women to realize their full human rights. At the United Nations, March brings women from around the globe to New York to attend the UN Commission on the status of Women. This year’s celebration also marks the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). This groundbreaking document was championed by an extraordinary woman, Eleanor Roosevelt, and has become the defining frame for all of us who seek to ensure that all human beings can aspire to lives of dignity and justice.
A Gift to Africa joins many local organizations to honor this wonderful time for women. One of the products we market at A Gift To Africa is a used tea-bag greeting card from Original T Bag Designs in Cape Town South Africa which graciously has Eleanor Roosevelt saying which goes, “A Woman is like a Teabag, you never know how strong she is till you put her in hot Water” … well spoken.
Happy March to all the wonderful women across the world and not forgetting the men who support them!