Women urged to take up leadership roles

The acting Director of the Department of Gender at the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, Mrs Catherine Bob-Milliar, has urged women to take up leadership roles to help improve their representation in decision-making.

She said women constituted majority of the country’s population, so it was necessary for them to be well represented to make meaningful impact on national development.

“If you cannot take up leadership positions, encourage your daughters in the universities to participate in such roles,” she said.

Mrs Bob-Milliar said this at a meeting of the Women Organisations Meeting (WOM) Network held in Accra. The meeting was attended by representatives of women groups and networks in the country to interact with officials of the department on their concerns.

Mrs Bob-Milliar said the ministry recognised the vital contributions made by the various women groups towards women empowerment and gender equality in the country and gave the assurance that they would be encouraged to perform more effectively.

Open Forum

In an open forum, the women expressed concern about the plight of kayayei (female porters), unequal opportunities for women’s advancement, lack of funds for women’s groups and the proliferation of unregistered women’s groups in the country.

The women also called on the ministry to revive the women’s groups by organising educational programmes for them to be abreast of current trends for development. They suggested that all women groups be brought together as one body to aid the development agenda of women in the country.

Response

Responding to concerns raised by the women, Mrs Bob-Milliar said their grievances would be communicated to the ministry for redress. 

She, however, indicated that issues concerning the ‘kayayei’  were very complicated because all attempts by the ministry to make them return to their various communities after they had acquired skills had proved futile.