Wa, March 10, GNA – The Affirmative Action Bill Coalition has appealed to Parliament to as a matter of urgency pass the Affirmative Action Bill into law to break the bias.
The Coalition said the Affirmative Action Bill aimed to ensure the provision of opportunities that will help bridge the gap in gender representation in government as well as in other areas of public and private life.
In a statement issued on Tuesday to mark the International Women’s Day and copied the GNA said the day was set aside to celebrate women’s social, economic, cultural, and political achievements as well as making a call to action for accelerating gender parity.
The celebration is on the theme: “Gender Equality Today for a Sustainable Development Tomorrow” with the campaign theme as ‘BreakingTheBIas’.
Mrs Sheila Minkah-Premo, the Convener of the Coalition who signed the statement said the Coalition was concerned about the government’s commitment to passing the Affirmative Action Bill into law to break the bias.
She said, the bill, if passed into law, it wouldl effectively redress Ghana’s social, cultural, economic, and political gender imbalance, based on historical discrimination against women emanating from persistent patriarchal socio-cultural systems and norms despite de jure equality of men and women.
According to the statement the resulting unequal participation in both development processes and outcomes reinforces men and women’s unequal status and undermines sustainable development.
“The Bill is designed to help eliminate gender inequalities, based on the principle that each citizen shares an equal right to self-development and that women and men with equal abilities should have equal opportunities. This is in accordance with Article 17(4) of the 1992 Constitution”, the statement emphasised.
“The passage of the Affirmative Action (Gender Equality) Bill into law has taken too long in its passage”, she said adding that “Ghana has failed to ensure gender equality in public life despite its international and national obligation”.
The statement said the country had failed to meet the target in many international instruments and that Ghana will fail to meet other key gender equality targets, especially SDG 5, if the Bill is not passed by the end of 2022.
“There have been several drafts of the Bill, with the first one being prepared in 2013 following extensive consultations in all the regions and we are reliably informed that the 2020 version of the Bill is before Cabinet pending Parliamentary approval”, the statement said.
The statement therefore called on all Members of Parliament, especially the women in Parliament, to quickly pass the Bill into law when it is laid before them since both sides of the House was supporting the Bill.
“Civil society and the media should continue the advocacy and campaign until we see this Bill passed into law. We will continue to engage and remind the government of Ghana of its commitment on various international platforms to ensure gender parity by passing the Affirmative Action Bill into law.
GNA