22 Jun 2014

Botswana is fully committed to the principle of gender equality and empowerment of women, says permanent secretary in the Ministry of Labour and Home Affairs, Mr Ikwatlhaeng Bagopi.

 Speaking at a consultative forum on validation of the country report on implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action (Beijing +20 Country Report), Mr Bagopi said this commitment is demonstrated through prioritisation of gender and women empowerment in the national policy and planning framework.

He said over the years gender equality has become increasingly accepted as key to the development process, especially after the 1995 Beijing United Nations conference on women. “This in turn saw government formulating the National Gender Programme Framework (NGPF) prioritising six critical areas of concern for Batswana women,” he said.

He further revealed that the focus areas included poverty, economic empowerment of women, women in power and decision making, education and training for women, women in health, the girl child and violence against women including human rights.

He added that over the years Botswana has taken on board other emerging issues such as women and the media, environment and climate change as well as engagement of men as strategic partners in gender issues. He further said Botswana has made progress since the 1995 Beijing conference.

“A significant number of women now hold key positions in the private sector, parastatals and public sector. Enrolment of the girl child in schools is also unparalleled,” he said.

He confidently declared that the girl child in Botswana ranks among the most cultured and educated, which reflects positively on Botswana’s efforts. However, said Mr Bagopi, even though significant strides have been made in women empowerment, Batswana need to introspect and collectively support government’s efforts towards women empowerment. He added that Botswana is firmly committed to putting more women into parliament and councils and urged everyone to remain firm.

 He said Botswana is required to periodically report on progress made in implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action, hence the consultative forum to obtain views and perspectives from stakeholders.

“This is a critical session for all of us. We have an opportunity to dialogue and review progress made on implementation of key areas of concern which were identified during the Beijing conference on women in 1995,” he said.The report put a lot of emphasis on poverty eradication initiatives and their significance in creating economic empowerment and fighting poverty in Botswana.

Stakeholders at the meeting decried that implementation of these poverty eradication initiatives was lagging behind. ENDS