Programme Number: 038
Week of: Sunday, 6th March, 2005
Recording Date: Thursday, 10th March, 2005
Topical Issue(s):

" Ten years after the world conference on women which was held in Beijing, women from around the world came to the UN Headquarters to review progress that has been made. The review coincided with this year's session of the Commission on the Status of Women. The Executive Director of the UN Development Fund for Women, Noeleen Heyzer says that while progress has been made in the advancement of women, more still needs to be done. The Executive Director of Femmes Africa Solidarite, Bineta Diop says that African women are no longer mere victims of violence but are actively engaged in efforts to resolve conflicts in Africa.

Editor / Presenter: Ransford Cline-Thomas
Producer: Derrick Mbatha
Production Assistant: Eloisa Ugalde
Studio Engineer: Carlos Marcias

Duration: 15'00"

PRESENTER: Hello and welcome to United Nations Radio from New York.

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PRESENTER:
This is, UN and Africa. I'm Ransford Cline-Thomas.

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PRESENTER:
Today's programme is a special edition dedicated to the issue of the advancement of women, ten years after they adopted a declaration in Beijing to promote their rights. Has there been any progress in improving the status of women, particularly in Africa?

CLIP-1: Noeleen Heyzer
"What is extremely important is to end violence against women. We need to make violence against women history and this can be done."

PRESENTER:
Noeleen Heyzer, the Executive Director of the UN Development Fund for Women speaking about one of the challenges in the struggle to improve the lives of women. On the African continent women are increasingly asserting their right to participate in ending conflict that have plagued the continent.

CLIP-2: Bineta Diop
"We are in the field trying to support our sisters in solidarity because we say that we Africans have to take our own destiny in our hands"

PRESENTER:

Bineta Diop of a non-governmental organization that is active in efforts to resolve conflicts in Africa. Later you will hear more about how women in Africa are contributing to the resolution of conflicts and what they have achieved in other areas.

Stay tuned to UN and Africa.

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TEN-YEARS AFTER BEIJING

PRESENTER:
Since last week women from around the world have been discussing issues concerning their rights to live as equal partners with men. Government ministers, experts, representatives of the United Nations, as well as non-governmental organizations converged on UN Headquarters in New York, to review progress that has been made to implement a declaration and platform of action that were adopted at the women's conference in Beijing, China, ten years ago. The review coincided with this year's session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women. Bissera Kostova reports.

NARR: Many participants in the session of the UN Commission on the Status of women noted that tangible progress has been achieved in creating greater equality between men and women since the Beijing conference ten years ago. They pointed out, however, that much more still needs to be done as women continue to lag behind men in many areas of life. This is a point stressed by Noeleen Heyzer, the Executive Director of the UN Development Fund for Women.

CUT 1: We have made progress around the world in terms of a legal framework and the rule of law on behalf of women around the world in terms of some of the areas on property rights, protection of migrant workers, some of changes in family code.

NARR: One area in which efforts are being made to change the law and family code is inheritance. In many so-called traditional societies, including in Africa, women are still not regarded as heirs to their families' wealth and land.

CUT 2: Many of the countries in Africa are struggling so hard to change inheritance laws and rights to land. A very good change, again, has been Rwanda in 1999 and this has been almost step by step, taking each case at a time and making sure that this happens.

NARR: Ms. Heyzer says progress has also been made in adopting policies that promote equal rights of men and women and participation in political decision making.

CUT 3: One hundred and twenty governments, in fact, have policies on gender equality. Hundred and seventy nine countries have, in fact, signed CEDAW, the Convention on Women and today there are more women in parliament in some countries than ever before. And Rwanda is a very good example at 49 per cent.

NARR: But while some progress has been made to promote the rights of women, as Noeleen Heyzer points out, much more still needs to be done. She says there are one million women and girls who are still trafficked, or who are forced to work in sweat shops around the world. And on the African continent, the HIV/AIDS pandemic has added to the hardships women and girls have to face.

CUT 4: There is still no progress when HIV/AIDS increasingly takes on a young woman's face, and therefore there is much that needs to happen in bringing about gender equality and gender justice in an increasingly insecure and unequal world.

NARR: Ms Heyzer says that women around the world, including African women, have identified specific areas in which action must be taken. One such area is security from physical harm.

CUT 5: What is extremely important is to end violence against women. We need to make violence against women history and this can be done. Women must be secure in their homes, in their workplaces, in their communities and violence against women must be condemned as a weapon of war everywhere. There must be an end to impunity.

NARR: According to the head of the UN Development Fund for Women the security of women should be linked to development and the eradication of poverty.

CUT 6: And the best way of doing this is to close all gender gaps in income everywhere in the world today. Decent and secure work for women everywhere, including in the informal sector.

NARR: Ms. Heyzer says women should also have access to economic assets such as land and property. On the issue of HIV/AIDS, she stresses that prevention and care should take into account the situation of women who are more vulnerable to the pandemic. Another important area, particularly in Africa which has been torn by conflicts is peace and security.

CUT 7: We have to make sure that where decisions are being made, where the future of communities and societies are being forged women are there at the table and also to shape resource allocations.

NARR: That was Noeleen Heyzer, the Executive Director of the UN Development Fund for Women. Reporting for UN Radio, I am Bissera Kostova.

STING/JINGLE: UN AND AFRICA THEME

PRESENTER:

As you have just heard, one of the major concerns that women
have is lack of participation in peacemaking and the rebuilding
of communities after a conflict. It has been noted for example that
in most cases wars are started by men when in fact women become
victims of these wars where some of them get raped by armed men
as has been seen recently in Sudan and the Democratic Republic
of the Congo. But women in Africa are not merely victims of these
conflict. Some of them have realized that in order to solve some of
the problems they face and to create conditions for the
development of the continent, they have to participate in ending
conflicts. One such woman is Bineta Diop, the Executive Director
of a women's non-governmental organization known as Femmes
Africa Solidarite. She is one of thousands of women who
are participating in the review of the Beijing Platform for Action.
She told UN Radio's Derrick that when women met in Beijing ten
years ago, some African women went there to share their
experiences as victims of conflicts. But now, the situation has
changed somewhat.

DIOP: Now, ten years after that, I was listening to my sisters who have been very much empowered in the process. For example, the Mano River Women Peace Network who brought back the three heads of state to negotiate. They become mediators themselves. Another example, somebody from Somalia, where the Somalis were negotiating on the basis of clan and she said, my half is my family clan, my other half is my husband's, let me form another clan which is called the women, with my feminism with my sisters and in solidarity. Let's come and face the men and tell them we want peace. So it means that the women have been so much empowered that they are not scared of coming to the highest table to negotiate peace.

MBATHA: So you are saying that the issues of war and peace are very important to be discussed at the forum for women here.

DIOP: Yah. There is a resolution 1325 which was adopted by the Security Council to say that women have to be part and parcel and the issues that they raise should be in the forefront of any decision or any programmes that are implemented regarding peace and security. That's one thing. But if you look at the military apparatus in Africa, it is still male dominated. And what you find there is the violence. So we are saying no to this violence. We have to stop it. We have to make sure that women are sitting at the decision making. So we look into the military system.

MBATHA: On the military itself, is there anything that you as women can do to correct this domination by men?

DIOP: Precisely. For example, on the issue of the arms, we had a meeting here with our sisters from the north, with Americans here and we were telling them all the arms are coming from outside. So we said do your right work home to make sure that the arms are not fuelled in our conflict. And not only that, if you look at countries where there conflicts, it's those countries which are rich.

MBATHA: And on trying to stop the inflow of arms from the weapons-producing countries, how has this message been received so far?

DIOP: For example, during the meeting, what came was let's form a global coalition. Today we launched the mapping peace. It's a big peace map where we say that the military usually they have their map and they know where are the troops. They say our troops are here, and we have ten soldiers of this and thousand here and they have their strategies. So we are saying let's see like the military, let's have our big strategy, so let's link ourselves. Let's see that there are ten women in Liberia who are doing this. There are hundred in South Africa. So let's mobilize our troops. So when you put it in the balance, you have the military in one balance, you have the women peace movement in another balance. Not only the women peace movement as women, but there are men who are very much involved in this woman's peace movement.

MBATHA: That's an interesting initiative. How are you going to go about implementing it? How are you going to coordinate it?

DIOP: There is a big coalition which was launched by the First Lady of Egypt, heading the peace movement in Geneva with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Switzerland. But many of us, Getrude Mongella, the president of the Pan African Parliament, many many African leaders and European, all over north and south, we came together and said let's form a big coalition because with this big coalition we can map the peace but also we can make sure that we put our efforts together, our initiative, our resources when something is happening somewhere we go in peace mission. We did it in many places.

MBATHA: For example?

DIOP: For example, in Liberia one of the first missions we did was to come and visit our Liberian sisters but also to give them some capacity building, training, share our experience. We did in Burundi. We went to visit the refugee camps and in fact some of the women's group when President Mandela was doing the negotiation in Burundi, we brought all the women together to meet him to discuss with him the programme on the peace effort that he was leading in Burundi. We did the same thing. We went to meet President Museveni with the Burundian group. What we did in Mano River was to bring the women to meet President Taylor, President Kabbah and so on and so forth. We are in the field trying to support our sisters in solidarity, because we say that we Africans we have to take our destiny in our hands.

MBATHA: How would you assess the situation on the African continent as far as parity is concerned when it comes to decision making positions? Are you happy with what has happened so far?

DIOP: Oh. We are happy in some areas and we are not happy in other areas. Rwanda is the first one in the world now. We are very happy to quote the Rwanda parliament because they have almost fifty per cent of women in the parliament. If you take South Africa, you will be very happy to see women ministers and this is the political will, really of President Thabo Mbeki and the government to make sure that women are represented. You take other countries. My God! For example even the women who have been fighting in Somalia for the new the transitional government they have only one woman in the cabinet. We are talking about thirty per cent in the Beijing process. The heads of state will gather and what they will is about gender issues. They did it in Addis this last year. And this year they are going in July to report themselves on what the governments have done on gender issues. Here in New York, we have seen progress but still a lot needs to be done.

MBATHA: As an African woman, what do you expect to come out of this session of the Commission on the Status of Women?

DIOP: I think this process is not going to be, I hope, another paper, because we say that even if we don't have paper, what we wanted is implementation. For us in Africa we have moved on the gender equality issues, but in other continents it's no longer a priority. We have seen it in the debate. So for us it is not just going now to convince our leaders because they are convinced. As we see it, we are looking forward for the implementation. But what is going to be a huge priority for us is also to look into what is happening at the international level.

MBATHA: Thank you very much.

PRESENTER:

That was Bineta Diop, the Executive Director of
Femmes Africa Solidarite speaking with UN Radio's Derrick
Mbatha.

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PRESENTER:
You've been listening to, UN and Africa, from United Nations Radio in New York.
I'm Ransford Cline-Thomas. Thank you for listening. And thanks to the team: Producer Derrick Mbatha, Production Assistant Eloisa Ugalde and studio engineer, Carlos Marcias.

Goodbye.

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