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UN and Africa
Programme Number: 075
Week of: Sunday, 20th November, 2005
Recording Date: Thursday, 24th November, 2005
Topical Issue(s):
- Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has been declared
the winner of Liberia's presidential run off, becoming
the first woman to be elected head of state in Africa.
She expresses the hope that her winning of the election
will inspire other women in Africa to aspire and work
hard for the highest political office. She says her
party is committed to the processes of peace and stability
through reconciliation and a government of inclusion.
- Ghana's Minister of Communications of Ghana, Albert
Kan-Dapaah says that his country is taking a number
of steps to develop information and communication
technologies.
Editor / Presenter: Ransford Cline-Thomas
Producer: Derrick Mbatha
Production Assistant: Eloisa Ugalde
Studio Engineer: Sally O'Brien
Duration: 15'00"
RESENTER: This is United Nations Radio in New York.
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wave, and hold under narr.)
PRESENTER:
Hello and welcome to UN and Africa, I'm Ransford Cline-Thomas.
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and hold under)
PRESENTER:
In today's programme Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf becomes
Africa's first women to be elected head of state.
The National Election Commission of Liberia confirmed
her election on Wednesday. What impact does the Liberian
president-elect think her election will have on other
African women?
CLIP-2: ELLEN JOHNSON-SIRLEAF
"This one added value of having reached the highest
political office in the land I
think will set the example and I expect that women
all over Africa will compete with
much more confidence and more effectively so that
they will be I think before the end
of this decade more women that will be presidents
or heads of state."
NARRATOR:
We will hear more from Ellen Johnson Sirleaf in a
moment.
Well also in the programme today we hear about what
Ghana is doing to promote information and communication
technologies which are increasingly playing an important
role in the economic and social developing of countries
around the world.
CLIP-1: ALBERT KAN-DAPAAH
"We have decided to use ICT not only as a tool
to create wealth but also to use ICT to improve upon
delivery of government services."
PRESENTER:
And that was Albert Kan-Dapaah, Ghana's Minister of
Information and Communication. More from the Minister
later in the programme.
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until first sentence.)
LIBERIAN JOHNSON SIRLEAF BECOMES AFRICA'S FIRST ELECTED
HEAD OF STATE
PRESENTER:
History has been made in Liberia this week with the
election of Africa's first woman head of state. She
defeated her rival, former soccer star George Weah
in the run-off elections two weeks ago. Mr. Weah challenged
the results claiming that there was fraud because
some election workers had stuffed ballot boxes. Liberia's
election commission noted
his complaint and began to look into the case. International
observers have said that the election was free and
fair and Wednesday's announcement confirm that determination.
The presidential run-off election was part of the
process of normalizing this country which has suffered
more than a decade of a vicious civil war. At United
Nations headquarters in New York, the
Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, has welcomed the Liberian
National Commission's announcement of the official
results, in a statement read by his spokesman, Stephane
Dujarric.
CUT 1: STEPHANE DUJARRIC
"The Secretary-General extends his warm congratulations
to Mrs. Ellen
Johnson-Sirleaf on her election as Africa's first
woman head of state in the modern
era. The results show that Mrs. Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf
of the Unity Party received
59.4% and Mr. George Weah of the Congress for Democratic
Change 40.6% of the
total valid votes cast."
PRESENTER
The Secretary-General noted that the National Elections
Commission will will continue to conduct active and
open hearings on the complaints received concerning
the conduct of the run-off elections.
CUT 2 STEPHANE DUJARRIC
"He urges a timely conclusion of this important
process in order to allow all Liberians to focus on
the urgent tasks of national reconciliation, reconstruction
and good governance. The Secretary-General wishes
to assure the newly-elected government of the continued
support of the United Nations, as Liberia lays the
foundations for lasting political stability and sustainable
economic development."
PRESENTER:
UN Spokesman Stephane Dujarric.
STING/JINGLE: UN AND AFRICA THEME
PRESENTER:
Well as you have just heard, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf
has made history by becoming the first woman to be
elected head of state in Liberia. Patience Guano of
the United Nations Mission in Liberia spoke with Madame
Johnson-Sirleaf and first asked for her reaction to
being the first woman to be elected President on the
African continent.
JOHNSON-SIRLEAF: Obviously, I am very pleased. I am
also very humbled by this great confidence that the
Liberian people have placed in me and I'm quite aware
of the responsibility that this implies to be able
to make a difference in the lives of the Liberian
people and also to set an example for women all over
the African continent so that the opening of this
door will be permanent and there will be many others
that will follow me.
PATIENCE: So do you think your success will also
influence other women in Africa to run for office?
JOHNSON-SIRLEAF: Oh, absolutely, and let us be mindful
that already throughout Africa today, we have women
holding very high level positions you know as Prime
Ministers, as Ministers in different portfolios, as
members of Parliament, so this one added value of
having reached the highest political office in the
land, I think, will set the example and I expect that
women all over Africa will compete with much more
confidence and more effectively so that they will
be, I think, before the end of this decade more women
that will be presidents or heads of state and all
of that and I think that's a welcome development.
PATIENCE: So how do you believe your election as
President will affect the lives of the average Liberian?
JOHNSON-SIRLEAF: Oh, we are committed to the processes
of peace stability through reconciliation, through
a government of inclusion and then we are going to
implement a very robust reform agenda that will make
sure that we have a new political order, a new social
order, a new economic order, one in which Liberians
will own their own destiny and will have a say in
their destiny. One in which there will be equal opportunity
for all through participation in all aspects of our
national endeavour and I hope that this will lead
to programmes of education, programmes of decentralization
so that every Liberian feel that they have a stake
in the future and never again would a Liberian feel
so excluded, and so disenchanted that they have to
resort to violence because they will know that the
future for them is bright as long as they are willing
to remain peaceful, lawful, honest and hard working.
PATIENCE: What message is in your success for young
girls in Liberia?
JOHNSON-SIRLEAF: Young girls should now know they
will have every opportunity to be what they want to
be to reach their potential in life. First of all,
I'm going to make sure the girl child have equal opportunity
to get an education. Many of our young girls who don't
have the means to go to school because their families
are poor, we'll see what we can do to them to take
them off the streets and get them into schooling,
consistent of course with our resource availability.
Also, they should know that we are going to be looking
at the laws for their protection so that those who
violate our girls will know that they will bear the
force of the law. Things like domestic violence and
rape where practices have not given them proper protection,
they can assure that in my government that we will
be assuring that this is done. And so I hope generally,
young girls will also see me as a role model and that
is going to raise their own expectations and ambition
as to what they want to be in their society.
PATIENCE: What is the first thing you hope tackle
when you take office?
JOHNSON-SIRLEAF: We want to respond to the special
needs of the youth, particularly the war affected
youth both ex-combatants and victims to make sure
that whatever benefits they were entitled to under
the disarmament, demobilization, re-integration and
rehabilitation programme, that they obtained this
benefit, we want to make sure that we get these youths
into school and into skills training programme, where
applicable, a combination of jobs so they're able
to sustain themselves and reduce their vulnerability
for recruitment for bad purposes. Everywhere I went
during the campaign and asked what the youth felt
they wanted most and they said education. And so I
am going to put special emphasis on ensuring that
they have the opportunity for an education.
PATIENCE: What is the most pressing issue for women
in Liberia?
JOHNSON-SIRLEAF: I think just making sure women have
equal opportunity, that their status in society, social
status, economic status, a look at our laws, that
they have access to the factors of production. In
terms of women in the informal sector, I know the
conditions under which they work as they carry out
their activities in the markets. And I've made a commitment
to them that we are going to see that those conditions
are improved, that they can work under conditions
that are sanitary, that enable them to have the means
of taking care of their babies, and their young children
that they take to the market for them. We'll not be
able to do everything for everybody and every market
and every group, let's be clear but I think we can
have a programme where we do something in every county
that brings a little more relief to the women where
they work because that's how they support their children
to go to school.
PATIENCE: Are you at all worried that if you do not
succeed in doing what you hope to do for Liberia,
it won't be termed that it's because you're a woman
that's why you didn't succeed?
JOHNSON-SIRLEAF: No, I think let's make it clear.
I'm a professional. I'm a technocrat who happens to
be a woman. So while I hope to bring womanly sensitivity
to everything that I do by putting a human face on
all we do, my own performance is going to be based
on my professionalism which has been well established
through my career for several years.
PATIENCE: Finally before we leave you, is it that
easy to, as a woman, to be in public office?
JOHNSON-SIRLEAF: No, not for me. I mean, I've been
in public office for well over two decades and at
several levels in high positions in both the private
and the public sector so it's not hard for me. Yes,
I will say that when a woman is making an entry into
professional equality you face obstacles because you
don't immediately get the respect and the confidence
of men since we all operate in a male dominated world
but I think once you work hard and you demonstrate
your capacity and you earn the respectability, professional
respectability, then it's smooth sailing after that.
PRESENTER:
That was Liberia's President-elect Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf,
speaking
there to Patience Guano of the United Nations Mission
in Liberia.
STING/JINGLE: UN AND AFRICA THEME
GHANA PROMOTES INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION
TECHNOLOGIES
PRESENTER:
Bridging the digital divide was once again discussed
at the World Summit on the Information Society recently
held in Tunisia. Ghana's Minister of Communications,
Albert Kan-Dapaah told UN Radio's Donn Bobb that a
couple of years ago, Ghana decided to adopt information
and
communication technologies, or ICTs as an important
tool for developing the country's economy and improving
people's lives. Mr. Dapaah said that since then, the
government has been working on its information and
communication infrastructure and training people.
He said Ghana was the first country in Africa to liberalize
the telecommunication sector and to
allow the participation of he private sector.
DAPAAH: The results have been tremendous. At the end
of 2000 the total number of customers we had in Ghana
was only about 400,000 customers out of a population
of 20 million. Four years later or up to now the total
number of customers have gone up to about 2.5 million
customers. So we have, in fact, been very very successful
in development the telecom infrastructure. Today we
are in the process of supporting our initiative to
encourage connectivity by extending the reach of the
fibre optics that we have in the country.
BOBB: In your efforts to improve the infrastructure
to provide connectivity, what were the challenges,
and now that you have done that, what are the opportunities?
DAPAAH: The challenges were many. First of all we
needed to accept that government in itself didn't
have the money to provide the infrastructure. Therefore
a deliberate decision was made that we will use the
private sector. I think one problem we did encounter
which we are only just about overcoming was that because
we were the first to liberalize in the continent,
we were not able to attract the major telephone companies
and companies that came were the small medium sized
one who were not very very rich in terms of what they
could contribute by way of equity. The tendency therefore
was for them to try to expand their network with profits
that they would have generated from within Ghana itself.
That slowed down the process considerably.
BOBB: And the opportunities?
DAPAAH: The opportunities are significant. We still
are talking of a country of twenty million people
as at now. Only 2.5 million people have access to
telephones now. I want to believe that there is still
a huge market out there for other companies that want
to come in to do business in Ghana. We have decided
to use ICT not only as a tool to create wealth but
also to use ICT to improve upon the delivery of government
services. Most of the value added services are expected
to come from the private sector. So I think there
are a lot of opportunities, significant opportunities
for companies that want to do business in Ghana. they
want to enter into a market.
BOBB: What impact is this likely to have on the Ghanaian
economy?
DAPAAH: We in Ghana are very lucky because we have
just cooperated with the World Bank to start a $40
million project that we call the e-Ghana project.
And we are going to use this project, first of all
to achieve our objective of using ICT to create wealth.
They are going to support us in the area of business
processing, outsourcing and we are also going to use
the project to improve upon the delivery of government
services in many many areas. I will give you one example.
Land registration in Ghana today is very very difficult,
is very very time consuming. This is largely because
the records are manually kept. We hope under this
project that under a public-private partnership arrangement
we are going to be able to computerize the land registration
processes and offer better services.
PRESENTER
Albert Kan Dapaah, Ghana's Minister of Communications
in an interview
with UN Radio's Donn Bobb.
STING/JINGLE: UN AND AFRICA THEME
PRESENTER:
And that's all for this edition of UN and Africa.
From me, Ransford Cline-Thomas, Producer Derrick
Mbatha, Production Assistant Eloisa Ugalde and engineer
Sally O'Brien bye for now.
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