UGANDA UGANDA

Permanent Mission of Uganda

to the United Nations

New York

ADDRESS BY

 

 

H.E. DR SPECIOSA WANDIRA KAZIBWE

VICE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF UGANDA

 

 

 

AT THE UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY

SPECIAL SESSION (UNGASS) ON BEIJING +5

NEW YORK

JUNE 7TH, 2000

 

 

 

 

 

Mr. President,

Distinguished Guests,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Thank you for availing us the opportunity to share some of our experiences in Uganda on the challenges of implementing the recommendations of the Beijing Platform of Action for the Advancement of Women.

Beijing Platform of Action

The Seven Critical Areas Cited for Action

The 1995 Beijing Conference set the Platform for Action in what were

considered critical areas that would make a difference include:

• Protecting the human rights of women and the girl child as an

integral part of universal human rights;

• Eradicating poverty of women;

• Removing the obstacles to women's full participation in public life

and decision making at all levels including the family;

• Eliminating all forms of violence against women;

• Ensuring equal access for girl children and women to education

and health services;

• Economic autonomy for women and ensuring their access to Productive resources; and

• Encouraging an equitable sharing of family responsibilities.

Today, five years since we left Beijing, what are our achievements, successes and failures and how far have we gone towards implementing these strategies which we set in Beijing?

Many Questions still remain unaswered for exmaple.

• Have the UN Systems fulfilled the responsibilities that the Beijing

Platform charged them with? Did the UN Organizations play a key

role in following up, implementing and monitoring the

implementation of the Beijing resolutions and recommendations?

• Has the Gender perspective been placed in the mainstream of all

aspects of the work of the UN Organization as promised by Mr.

Boutros Bourtros Ghali the then UN Secretary General? Has there

been swift and effective implementation of the Beijing

recommendations? Have the civic and political leaders been

instrumental enough in promoting the Advancement of Women?

What is our next strategy?

Achievements

Today many countries have now acceded to the Convention on

Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the Convention of the Rights of the Child, United Nations Human Rights Instruments and Labour Conventions.

Few countries appear to have made some progress towards the implementation of the UN resolutions and the Beijing Platform for Action. My country Uganda has given the matter a top priority.

First of a11, we are blessed to have a gender sensitive President who has spearheaded, inspired and supported many crusades and initiatives for the Advancement of Women. For him, the women's cause is not a Platform for mere politicking and cheap popularity for the sake of votes. The Advancement of Women is crucial to the Nations's development.

The National Constitution

We have a Constitution which provides for and guarantees equity and equality between men and women. Subsequently laws have been enacted to ensure that the gender concerns are effectively addressed. The laws include;

  1. The Land Act which guarantees the occupancy of all women on marital property;
  2. Women councils with statutory linkages to women related non governmental organizations;
  3. We are now debating the domestic relations bill. Once finalized and enacted, it will ensure the protection and promotion of the dignity of women in marital relationships.

Affirmative Action

We have maintained the affirmative action policy. This has created the necessary role models at both political and administrative levels and shows the clear fruits of the education of the women in the country. It has further enabled us to more than double the enrollment of girls in tertiary institutions.

Education

i. Universal Primary Education (UPE) Policy

In 1997 Government adopted the Universal Primary Education (UPE) Policy. Under this policy, all children both boys and girls, enjoined to be in school through government support. This has resulted in tremendous increase in girls' enrollment in primary schools. Today, the enrollment is over 3 million as opposed to less than one million before the implementation of the policy.

ii. National Strategy for Girls Education

On the 1st of this month we launched the national strategy for girls education in Uganda. Our government takes cognizance of the fact that empowerment of women through education is a key strategy to achieve democracy, equality, sustainable development and peace and eradication of poverty. Uganda still believes in the adage that "educate a woman you educate the nation."

iii. Representation at Political Level

In a Cabinet of 51 Ministers and Ministers' of State we have 17 women. At the local government level, one third of all Council Members must be women. It is also now mandatory for every district to have a women's representative in Parliament. This policy has enabled us to raise the number of women members of Parliament to 50 out of the 288. Finally Uganda was the first African country to have a woman Vice President now before you.

Poor Status of Women

Although we have made these significant achievements, a lot remains to be done. For example we need to achieve 30% improvement in all area as agreed in Beijing.

It remains a question of social injustice when the women constitute more than 50% of the population but are enjoined to enjoy a mere 30% representation and even have much lesser share in the economic resources of out nations.

On the continental level the social, economic and political environment in Africa remains hostile to the Advancement of Women. Our political independence is of little significance when we remain economically mortgaged. Our participation in world trade is a mere symbolic of more or less than 2%. Wars and conflicts are still rampant, democracy and good governance is still a dream for many nations.

Globalization which promises heaven for the advanced economies, is a threat to the survival of the poor, the weak and the ignorant. Such is still the fate of the majority of women especially in the poor countries.

Throughout most of the developing world, school enrollment is still very low for girls. The drop out rate for girls progressively increases. Most of the girls that stay on go for academic qualifications rather than marketable skills.

With most of our women still functionally illiterate, it becomes increasingly difficult for them to take advantage of modern technology which would enhance their productivity and empowerment.

Our hope must be grounded in a framework for change, a framework in which competitive advantages of knowledge supersede the advantages of nature. We have unfortunately not been critical enough to guard against policies and practices which may in the long run serve to undermine the cause of our struggle and retard progress towards justice and equity.

During this century-,- the formula for gender balance is to give a bigger dose of education to the woman and the girl child in order to counterbalance the knowledge that men have used to keep the women in subjugation.

Communication and Information Technology

We have come to an age where knowledge and information is power. It is an age where survival will be difficult without access to information technology and science. Timely empowerment of the woman and the girl child through education is therefore very crucial to the survival of the woman and her liberation.

Holistic Approach to Women Empowerment

Advancement of women entails their empowerment at all levels. These levels and dimensions of empowerment presuppose adequate infrastructure; roads, electricity water, air transport, telecommunication and information technology. The rural areas must be accessed and modernized because in our revolutionary quest for social justice, equity and gender balance, we must be mindful of the fact that some solutions cannot be rushed much as the situation is urgent.

Role of the Non-governmental Organization (NGO)

NGO's have been very instrumental in marketing the gender cause. Emphasis has been on group action. There is need for a paradigm shift. NGOs are therefore challenged'-to come up with new strategies for competitive advantage for individual empowerment and sustainability.

Agriculture

In Africa most women are involved in agriculture but at a subsistence level using rudimentary methods. Agriculture must therefore be modernized. This is the short-term strategy for the economic empowerment of women, for the ensuring of food security, nutrition and for the improvement of family incomes.

Our agriculture must therefore be commercial oriented. We need agricultural and rural based technologies to reduce the workload for the rural women and enhance their productivity. All barriers to our entry into the global market should be removed. Competitiveness should be humane enough to ensure that the weak survive.

On behalf of the President of Uganda, His Excellency Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, on behalf of the people of Uganda, especially the women and on my own behalf, I would like to thank the Secretary General, sponsors and all men and women for all their contributions towards the success of this Session.

I thank you, Mr. President.