By Anthony Adongo Apubeo
Bolgatanga, March 20, GNA – Women and youth groups, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and key state agencies in the Upper East Region have been engaged on the Ghana’s Affirmative Action Gender Equity Act, as part of efforts to strengthen advocacy for its full implementation.
The Affirmative Action Gender Equity Act of 2024, Act 1121, aims to effectively address the country’s social, cultural, economic and political gender imbalances which stem from historical discrimination of women and persistence of patriarchal socio-cultural systems and norms.
It also aims to promote gender equity and women empowerment in both public and private sectors, ensuring deliberate mainstreaming of policies and strategies into their governance systems to enhance women’s representation and empowerment.
The engagement was part of the Power to Youth-Ghana project, being implemented by a consortium of three non-government organisations namely GH-Alliance, Norsaac and Songtaba with funding from the Dutch Embassy in Ghana.
The project seeks to create safe spaces for victims of abuses, empower adolescents and young people, particularly women and girls to address underlining issues of gender-based violence, gender inequality, child marriages, and teenage pregnancies among other sociocultural practices.
Speaking to the media on the sidelines of the engagement, Ms. Dorcas Manortey-Aggrey, Executive Secretary, emphasised the importance of empowering gender-focused groups and CSOs to intensifying the needed advocacy for the full implementation of the Affirmative Action Gender Equity Act.
She said not many people were abreast with the provisions of the Act, which was passed by Ghana’s Parliament in 2024, and it was important that relevant stakeholders and groups that had the potential to influence change to be empowered and equipped to ensure information trickled down to the local level.
“We believe that the participants will empower other organisations and people about the Act, influence policies at various levels including the community levels, engage with the chiefs to ensure there is equality between women and men, boys and girls at our various levels”, she said.
Ms. Manortey –Aggrey underscored the significant contributions of women at various levels of society, stressing that when more women were given opportunities and resources, it would help to breach the gender gap and accelerate the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly goal five which stressed the need to achieve gender parity by 2030.
In a presentation on the Affirmative Action Gender Equity Act, Mr. Adam Abugbila, Programs Coordinator, GH-Alliance, said although the Act aimed at ensuring equality and equity in all spheres of society, there were several gaps that needed amendment to achieve the desired results.
He mentioned that the Act which mandated the state and non-state institutions to ensure at least 40 percent representation of women in all institutions, mainstreaming gender responsive policies in their operations, however, did not specify sanctions for persons or institutions that failed to meet the provisions of the Act.
He, therefore, said while there was the need for CSOs and the media to intensify advocacy for the full implementation of the Act in both public and private institutions, there was also the urgent need for immediate steps to amend the Act to include sanctions, stressing, that would ensure that provisions were fully implemented.
Mr. Majeed Mumuni, Assistant Programs Officer, Upper East Regional Directorate of the National Youth Authority, said the training was timely as it would help to empower the youth groups to educate their peers about the Act and how they could harness it for their growth.
Ms. Gifty Abubire, a member of the Young Urban Women Movement, said she was enlightened on the provisions of the Act and pledged to share the knowledge with her colleagues to achieve maximum impact.
GNA