World YWCA Attends the African Women Leaders Network Meeting

Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda, General Secretary of the World YWCA and Melat Tekeletsadik, World YWCA volunteer from New York, participated in the drafting of the AWLN statement, and Gumbonzvanda was one of the speakers at the event. The statement, entitled ‘Investing in Women and Girls for Access to Reproductive Health and Rights and Family Planning’,  underlies the concerns of the members of the AWLN  and requests the UNCPD to do more to address those issues that particularly affect women and children in Africa.

The statement addressed a wide range of challenges facing women in Africa, including the high rate of maternal mortality, the high prevalence of HIV and AIDS compounded by the lack of adequate and appropriate reproductive health and family planning services for HIV positive women, and the lack of information, counselling, support, and access to quality and affordable services for women of all ages.  The AWLN also mentioned the challenges that African women have to bear due to harmful social norms and gender-based traditions, such as the escalating incidences of domestic violence, sexual and gender-based violence, female genital mutilation, early marriage, and other harmful cultural practices. They also addressed the danger of invisible non-communicable diseases, such as cancer and mental health.

The challenge for African women is wide-ranging and complex. This is further enhanced by the inadequate resources allocated by global, regional and national institutions to address gender equality and reproductive health problems. Moreover, women are often underrepresented in decision-making roles that affect their lives. Thus, AWLN members demanded prioritisation of these pressing issues within this years’ Commission agenda, as well as the overall MDG framework.  In addition they expressed their appreciation for the space provided for the participation of civil society during the Commission.

The following are the recommendations made by the AWLN:

• The adoption of a holistic and comprehensive approach to addressing sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) namely for governments to recommit resources in the national budgets to reproductive health and family planning
• Investing in comprehensive and rights based sexuality education, especially for young people
• Create policies, budgets and programmes that enable access to quality, affordable, integrated services, commodities and referrals
• Recognise resource and strengthen community social networks and institutions, especially women’s groups, for their programmes on reproductive and family planning
• Recognise positive culture as building blocks for addressing issues of fertility and reproductive health, while addressing and eliminating harmful practices that undermine women’s rights
• Continue to invest in contextual research in advancing reproductive health and family planning that empower women and girls
• Continue to invest in technologies that reduce women’s burdens and enable them to be economically empowered. Create, facilitate and resource opportunities for women’s participation in decisions that impact their lives

The AWLN is a network composed of women ministers, parliamentarians and civil society leaders from all over Africa who are mobilising greater public support and political commitment to promote reproductive health and family planning as a fundamental human right. The AWLN is committed to advancing the implementation of different conventions that address these issues, such as: the  Maputo Plan of Action on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights; the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa; the 2001 Abuja Declaration on HIV, Tuberculosis and Other Related Infectious Diseases (that calls for 15% budgetary commitments to health); the African Union Campaign on Accelerated Reduction of Maternal Mortality in Africa (CARMMA); and the International Commitment to Women and Reproductive Health (RH), especially the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) and the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).