‘Encourage more women to enter into politics’
The Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Damango, Most Rev. Peter Paul Yelezuome Angkyier, has called on the Christian Mothers Association (CMA) to encourage more women to enter into politics especially at the community level.
This, he said, was necessary because it was always very important to have good people in politics as it was about the general good, and when they were women it was even much better.
He made the call when organisers of the 2015 Konrad Adenauer Stiftung-sponsored workshop for members of the association called on him at his office at the Damango Diocese.
The workshop, which has ended, identified factors which impeded the active involvement of women in community politics and was on the theme: “Community politics and the under-representation of women; the Ghana experience.”
Women in decision-making
He said the involvement of women in decision-making gave them sufficient reasons to unearth their God-given talents and to develop themselves and their environment which constituted effective apostolate.
Bishop Angkyier said getting women into leadership positions had been a difficult issue in the various communities in the diocese, adding that the programme would benefit more women and was optimistic that more women would decide to contest the upcoming district assembly elections.
He said 80 per cent of women in the diocese were illiterates which was higher than the national average of 66 per cent.
Huge challenge
“This in itself presents a huge challenge on how to encourage women to be part of decision-making, especially in the political sphere. As a church, we are also involved in raising awareness,” he said.
He said although some people say women can cause conflict, they can also be peacemakers, because they play a crucial part in the development process, pointing out that: “This can only be done through education of women.”
The Resource Person for the programme, who is also the Gender Desk Officer for the West Gonja District Assembly, Madam Ophelia Alijata Haruna, described the organisation of the workshop as timely as the district assembly elections had been postponed.
