Media urged to report general election with ‘gender lens’

Conveners of the Women’s Situation Room (WSR) concept in Ghana have appealed to Ghanaian media practitioners and owners to report this year's general election with a ‘gender lens’.

They said that was necessary to protect women and children, who are considered the most vulnerable and should therefore not be treated on the same platform during election reporting.

Ghana’s process

Ghana has started the process to institute a WSR, which is one of the world's women's advocacy groups on elections, to tap into the expertise of women to prevent or mitigate conflict that could lead to violence at the December 7 polls.

Built on the United Nations’ Security Council Resolution 1325, the Women’s Situation Room concept, which reaffirms the important role of women in the prevention and resolution of conflicts, including electoral violence, was initiated by the Angie Brooks International Centre (ABIC), and implemented in Liberia during its 2011 presidential and legislative elections.

The concept is Africa’s unique approach to reducing electoral violence and it has been adopted by the African Union’s  Gender Is My Agenda Campaign (GIMAC) as a best practice, with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia as its champion.

The WSR concept has so far been replicated successfully in Senegal and Sierra Leone in 2012, Kenya in 2013, Nigeria in 2015 and Uganda, still ongoing, in 2016.

Consultative meeting

As part of the process, the West Africa Network for Peace building (WANEP), which is the convener of the WSR in Ghana, held a consultative meeting on the establishment of the WSR in Ghana which was attended by representatives of women’s groups in Ghana, as well as other stakeholders in peace building. 

Mr Frank Wilson Bodza of the Women in Law and Development Needs Africa (WILDAF), one of the three resource persons at a training workshop for journalists in the northern sector of the country in Kumasi, said specialists desks and airtime needed to be allotted to issues concerning women and children, with a calculated attempt to protect these groups. 

The training programme was on the theme: ' Responsible reporting and reporting with a gender lens.'

A total of 100,000 women across the regions,10,000 in each region, would embark on a peace march simultaneously, which would be climaxed in Accra on November 17, 2016, to urge politicians to consider their special needs and desist from fomenting trouble.  

It would also coincide with the launch of the Ghana version of the WSR where prominent women would present a composite statement to protect the rights of the vulnerable. 

Acquaintance with CI 94

A News Editor of the Ghana News Agency (GNA) and one of the Resource Persons, Mr Francis Ameyibor,  urged  journalists to acquaint themselves with the electoral laws, particularly Public Elections Regulation CI 94  which regulated the conduct of the 2016 general election, to avoid altercation with the security agencies on poll's day.

He said areas which needed to be critically looked at were parameters regarding interviews and accreditation. 

The WSR Intentional Coordinator, Ms Barbara Sangare, said the group would rely heavily on eminent women and other high-profile personalities (to be called 'the group of the wise') to bring their influence to bear on the election.

With barely five weeks to the polls, the names of ‘the group of the wise’ are yet to be made public.