17 Mar 2020

Women participation in sport does not call for just any woman, but competitive and credible women likely to make strides in the sports world.

Women and Sport Botswana (WASBO) chairperson, Matlho Kgosi said this during open discussion with Tsoseletso Magang themed: An equal world is an enabled world at Gaborone recently.

Matlho said while women were contesting for the same positions with their male counterparts, to change the landscape they needed men as their associates.

She said gender equality was not about women only but advocating for well-groomed women to occupy position to make a difference in their respective positions.

Furthermore, she said as WASBO they needed more women in technical roles and all structures and levels of sport.

“But then again it is not only about women leadership, it is also ensuring that the voice of a woman is at the table, be it in the boardroom or at play,” she said.

Botswana National Olympic Committee (BNOC) chief executive officer, Tuelo Serufho said to empower women the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) has reserved the third vice president spot for a woman out of their six leadership positions elected every four years.

He said people who crafted ANOC constitution saw the need to have women represented in the board.

For her part, Magang said women have overtime fought for equality in all spheres, including equal participation in sport.

 “We cannot deny that some glass ceilings have been shattered, and we must celebrate that. Hillary Clinton in her campaign for the presidency of the United States said when there are no ceilings, the sky’s the limit,” she said.

Magang said it was therefore important for women in sport to continue to shatter the glass ceilings so that the girl child could have the sky as the limit as well.

Furthermore, Magang said some of the issues that women in some, particularly in Africa, should ponder on was to grow in perceptions.

“We know the kind of perceptions that we live in, I am in football and it is still awkward to a lot of people that a girl plays football, so let us challenge the stereotype,” she said. Ends