Wa, Nov. 05, GNA – Madam Leenat Abdul-Rahaman, the Executive Director of Community Aid for Rural Development (CARD-Ghana), has urged girls to brace the odds to venture into leadership wherever they found themselves.
She said girls were relegated to the background in terms of leadership at the community and institutional leaves though they had the quality to also lead.
Madam Abdul-Rahaman said this at a leadership training session for about 40 Senior High School (SHS) girls in the Wa Municipality organised by CARD-Ghana with funding support from Plan International Ghana.
The participating schools were the Wa SHS, Wa Islamic SHS, Wa Technical Institute, Wa Secondary Technical SHS, and T. I. Amass SHS.
The Executive Director indicated that the training was premised on a baseline survey conducted by CARD-Ghana in SHSs to ascertain the state of girls’ participation in leadership at the schools.
She said the survey indicated that low self-esteem, fear, stereotypes, and discrimination against girls contributed to their reluctance in aspiring for leadership positions, while some positions in the schools were considered a preserve for the males.
“There is no doubt that significant progress has been made regarding women empowerment in Ghana, however, there still exist socio-cultural barriers that constrain women’s access to and control of resources and capabilities in the lifelong journey to success”, Madam Abdul-Rahaman explained.
She said the training programme was to prepare the girls for leadership positions through capacity building, mentoring, and coaching to identify and seek leadership opportunities to help bridge the leadership gap between the girls and their male counterparts.
Pognaa Amamata Mumuni, the Wa Municipal Girl Child Education Officer, entreated the girls to inculcate good leadership qualities and skills and stressed the need for them to venture into leadership positions at all levels they found themselves.
She identified some of those skills to include effective communication and listening skills, honesty, consideration of dissenting views, and prioritisation of issues among others.
“The leadership gap is there and now we want to bridge that gap. Like the government appointees at the assemblies, more men are appointed than women and the same applies to the election of assembly members. We don’t support ourselves as women, the pull her down syndrome is killing us”, she explained.
Mr Kassin Aminu, the Wa Municipal Director of the National Youth Authority, also took the girls through effective public speaking skills and said effective communication was an integral part of a leader, saying, “You need to develop good communication skills and master the art of public speaking”.
Some of the girls, who spoke to the Ghana News Agency, thanked the organisers and expressed confidence in contesting the various positions at the school when the opportunity comes.
According to them, girls lacked the confidence to contest the males, but the training had given them the confidence to contest for any position in the school.
GNA