AFRICAN WOMEN'S BUREAU FOCUSES ON GENDER, HIV
By Wezi Tjaronda

April 8, 2004 – (New Era) The Network of African Women Ministerial and Parliamentarian Bureau met yesterday in Windhoek to map out strategies for its sixth conference to be held in October in Gabon.

This is the fifth meeting the bureau has held since its inception in 1995 in Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso.

The chairperson of the bureau, Minister of Justice and Internal Administration in Cape Verde, Christina Fontes Lima, said at the start of the meeting yesterday women need to access decision-making positions to defend their agendas.

Noting that gender has to be stressed since issues such as HIV/AIDS have a female face, Lima said this challenges all women to action.

The meeting was called to carry on decisions that have been made to ensure the bureau forges ahead.

It was aimed at evaluating, monitoring, adopting resolutions and preparing for the next meeting, which will discuss gender and HIV/AIDS, domestic violence and preparing data for evaluation.

Dr Jacqui Badcock, the acting representative of the United Nations Population Fund, (UNFPA), which has funded the conference, said the low status of women in an African context where they have no negotiations skills for sex, makes them more vulnerable to the pandemic.

The theme of the meeting is Gender and HIV/AIDS: Reinforcing the National Response. Badcock said challenges, which aggravate the situation of gender and HIV/AIDS, remain a concern to all.

"Harmful traditional values, beliefs, practices and other cultural values, the ever growing number of orphaned children, the continuous denial, stigmatisation and fear of HIV/AIDS and under representation of women in legislative institutions, government executives and other decision-making bodies at international levels, are of great concern and need to be re-emphasised on the agenda of the network in seeking solutions," she said.

She urged the network, which comprises ministers and parliamentarians, to capitalise on the favourable opportunities such as the strong political will and conducive environment for HIV/AIDS and conflict resolution.

She hoped that decisions made by the network would lead to grassroots mobilisation, and adoption of gender parity by the African Heads of State within the African Union.

Badcock underlined the network's responsibility to adopt measures that would lead to social change in ways that will undermine the dramatic evolution of the pandemic.

In a brief background of the bureau, Minister of Women's Affairs and Child Welfare, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah said the network has so far held four meetings in Ouagadougou, Dar-es-Salaam, Windhoek and Cape Verde. These meetings have tackled HIV/AIDS, reproductive health and reproductive rights, resource mobilisation and the youth.

Yesterday's meeting was attended by Lima from Cape Verde, Minister Ndaitwah from Namibia, parliamentarian Dr Aisha Kigoda from Tanzania and Minister of Basic Education, Karimou Rafiatou from Benin.

The bureau is chaired by Cape Verde.

From: http://allafrica.com/stories/200404080951.html