Launch in the SADC Sub-region, 18th November 2009
By Merab Mulindi
The involvement of women in the IFAPA process is captured under A Mother’s Cry for a Healthy Africa Campaign which was adopted at the ‘mothers and daughters’ of Africa Pre-Summit that preceded the second IFAPA Peace Summit in Benoni in South Africa in 2005. The Campaign highlights the challenges faced on the continent of Africa and also the role of women in helping to bring about peace in Africa amidst these challenges. The Campaign also seeks to give opportunities to women to speak and also be heard and participate in making decisions that affect the continent as they are key stakeholders in matters facing the continent. The campaign is about Africa and strives to touch each of Africa’s five sub-regions. The word ‘healthy’ is used in the holistic sense of the word, beyond mere disease, rather wellness.
A healthy Africa is therefore an Africa that is spiritual and free from conflict and preventable diseases, an Africa in which the children and youth that have been given to us are cherished and not abused or neglected, an Africa in which women and men are acknowledged as equals, and in which women are not subjected to violence in war and in all aspects of life, an Africa for all Africans regardless of gender, tribe, nationality or religion.
A Mother’s Cry Campaign recognizes that men and women are perpetrators and victims of violent conflicts and wars, re-affirms that women are the cornerstone of social harmonization and integration of African societies and cannot be excluded from peace and security in Africa, underscores that spirituality and peace cannot be separated and that the values of diverse religions in Africa are essential to peace-building, believes that the intervention of inter-faith women in peace-building introduces a dimension that helps lead to comprehensive and sustainable peace in Africa.
In the launch of A Mother’s Cry Campaign in the SADC, IFAPA brought together women from all walks of life within the region to voice their concerns about issues affecting women in the region – issues of concern were presented by women from Mozambique, Zambia, Lesotho, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Botswana. Even for the countries not represented due to various factors or those which were represented by their brothers such as Mauritius and DRC or the ones not present such as Madagascar, Angola and Malawi, it was observed that the concerns are similar – deterioration of morals values, insecurity, gender-based violence, human trafficking, limited opportunities for women as among the challenges facing women of Africa today. Peculiarities of each country do exist but the challenges are very similar and all require joint action and good will from all sectors of society.
The theme of the Summit ‘Envisioning a Peaceful Africa: Water for All’ was very appropriate for the women of Africa. Water for drinking, sanitation and domestic use, water for health, water for agriculture, for economic empowerment of the woman – these are but some of the factors that draw women close to the subject of water. As the IFAPA Third Summit discussed this important subject, the relationship between African women and water was taken into consideration and acknowledged . Women in most African communities have traditionally taken the leading role in the provision of water for the family and the community. This role has too often had the negative consequence of preventing women from undertaking education, employment and leisure opportunities, due to the time required for water collection (especially as water sources become fewer and further between). Women’s involvement in community water management structures is nonetheless seen to be a necessity in the African context. Indeed, it is impossible to discuss water management at the local and national levels in Africa without the involvement of women.
Within the IFAPA Campaign A Mother’s Cry for a Healthy Africa, development issues – including access to safe drinking water – feature strongly. Inter-faith women’s roles in water source infrastructure and management can clearly be foreseen in the context of this campaign.
The Summit provided space for the women of the SADC sub-region to define what constitutes their ‘cry’ and to talk peace in this region which has many social, development, economic, trade, education, health, diplomatic, defense, security and political challenges. Some of these challenges cannot be tackled effectively by individual members thus the formation of SADC and some of the planned actions after the Summit would need to be tackled across borders. The region also has positive examples of hope and the host Botswana, remains one of Africa’s stable countries, relatively free of corruption and with a good human rights record. In Botswana too women empowerment has taken root. It was therefore befitting that the Summit and indeed the launch of the Mother’s Cry Campaign was held in this peaceful country.
Though the Campaign was already launched at continental level in 2005, it has not reached the grass-root woman nor the various policy makers in the various sub-regions of Africa who need to help respond to the Cry and help make Africa a better place. The launch in Southern Africa sub-region is the second one at the sub-regional level, the first one having taken place in Eastern Africa in June 2008 in Nairobi, Kenya. Some of the participants in that launch were also able to participate in the SADC launch and there are plans to carry out the same in the other sub-regions (West Africa, Central and North Africa) and some of the representatives of those sub-regions were also present in Gaborone during the SADC launch.
It is expected that what was shared in the Summit and in the Mother’s Cry event all formed a platform for further action. The women, men, religious leaders, business community and political sector representatives present at the Summit symbolized the need for all to work together. The women who participated in the Summit and in the launch did gain the synergy to take up responsibility to initiate and strengthen peace and other efforts in their countries. The involvement of the political, civil society, business and religious sectors highlights the fact that everyone is a stakeholder in peace and development and water remains at the centre of all well-being – of the individual person, of the community and even of the continent and is a common issue bringing all together regardless of the gender, faith and other lines of divide.
The Summit and the launch of the Mother’s Cry Campaign was therefore a platform for further action in the individual countries and in the region as a whole.
