Africa

About 650 million people in the world (10 per cent of the world’s population) live with disabilities, and frequently encounter a myriad of physical, economical and social obstacles. They often lack the opportunities of the mainstream population and are usually among the most marginalised in society. Often, women with disabilities are invisible both among those promoting the rights of persons with disabilities, and those promoting gender equality and the advancement of women. As noted in the Platform for Action document, created at the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, 1995, "Girls and women of all ages with any form of disability are among the more vulnerable and marginalised of society. There is therefore need to take into account and to address their concerns in all policy-making and programming. Special measures are needed at all levels to integrate them into the mainstream of development."

From April 17-21, 2012, the World YWCA held a regional sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) training session in Arusha, Tanzania and in Nairobi, Kenya, with 20 young women participants gathering from a number of African countries, including Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Ethiopia, and Zambia. One objective of this meeting was the review of the civil society regional report of the ICPD [1]+20 monitoring project [2] lead by the Asian-Pacific Resource and Research Centre for Women (ARROW). A second objective was to review the progress in advancing sexual and reproductive health and rights of young women supported by Packard Foundation.

Recently the state of Togo was on the agenda for the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) in March 2012 during the 19^th  Human Rights Council; during the UPR session the government of Togo highlighted the actions they have taken to enhance human rights within Togo. Historically, Togo has challenges in terms of human rights with accounts of torture, arbitrary detention and a very weak judiciary system. Although Togo, has taken steps towards progressing human rights and complying with United Nations conventions, human rights abuses still prevail. It was noted in the UPR discussions that violence against women, children and child abuse, prison overcrowding, poverty, illiteracy and women’s underrepresentation in decision-making bodies, are all of major concern for the UPR community and continue to be a challenge for the people of Togo.

Since its beginning the World YWCA Power to Change Fund has been making a positive difference to lives of women and young women around the world. Direct grant making to YWCA Member Associations has meant that projects have benefited from a capacity building approach The Power to Change Fund provides innovative leadership programmes and empowering opportunities through dialogues, training and sharing of experiences and skills at regional, national and global advocacy platforms. Projects in 2011 included a range of YWCA initiatives from around the world on violence against women, sexual and reproductive health and rights and HIV, and economic empowerment. Three such projects were carried out in Myanmar, Colombia and Tanzania.

“Today I felt the true strength of the women’s movement in Malawi. For so long it’s always been about different organisations with similar goals working in isolation, unable to draw from each other’s strengths, or learn from the other’s weaknesses. But on this day, women, girls, rich, poor, Christian and otherwise transcended all manner of real or perceived barriers, going above and beyond politics to raise a unified voice in protest against the abuse of women.” -  Rebecca Phwitiko, President YWCA of Malawi.

December 4^th  marked the official opening of the 16th International Conference on AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections in Africa (ICASA 2011) in Addis Ababa Ethiopia. The five-day conference under the theme ‘Own, Scale-up and Sustain’ expects to actively engage participants through high-level plenary sessions, satellite sessions, skills building, a poster exhibition and various side events. The World YWCA is participating in ICASA with a delegation of 15 women, including 12 young women, from eight YWCAs in Africa, led by Hendrica Okondo and Mandy Nogarede from the World YWCA and the General Secretary of YWCA of Ethiopia, Saba Haile.

Attended by some 80 participants from 24 African countries, including policy makers, activists, human rights lawyers, cultural practitioners, religious leaders, researchers, regional and international and development partners of the AU, the pan-African conference on ‘celebrating courage and overcoming harmful traditional practices in Africa.’ was held from October 5-7, 2011 in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. The conference was organised by the African Union Commission, with support from Deutsche Gesellschaft fuer Internationale Zusammenarbeit  (GIZ) on behalf of the German Government.

The 17th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, commonly known as COP17, will be held in Durban, South Africa, from November 29 to December 9, 2011.  Faith leaders from  South Africa and the rest of the world will participate and will have a strong presence at COP17, supported by a huge body of young people from Africa who will join in the “We have Faith – Act Now for Climate Justice” campaign. The initiative invites the public to sign what they hope will be a multi-million signature petition to be presented to the leaders of COP17.

The General Secretary of the YWCA of Zimbabwe, Sheila Matindike, was sworn in as a member of the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission (ZHRC) on September 1, 2011. The Zimbabwe Human  Rights Commission was established through a Constitutional Amendment provided for in Article 100R of the Global Political Agreement. The same article makes reference to the composition of the commission which shall, among other things, reflect gender balance. The Human Rights Commission is, therefore, composed of four women and five men. The commissioners were sworn in by the President after being interviewed by a Parliamentary Panel, including senior government officials like the Vice President and Deputy Prime Minister.