We must work hard and be united to support and protect the rights of the African woman.

* Sign the petition for the ratification of the Protocol on the Rights of Women online at or through your mobile phone by sending a text message to +27832933934 with the word 'petition' and your name in the message.

Members of the African Development Bank (ADB) group have agreed to pursue gender equality as a development issue because continuing inequality between men and women is proving a high cost to the development of the African continent. The bank said poverty on the continent is increasingly taking on a female characteristic, a phenomenon that has been termed as the feminisation of poverty.

Women are still marginalised by men in national decision-making bodies, participants to the 6th Annual General Conference of the SADC Electoral Commission Forum heard. Presenting a paper entitled "Elections, Democracy and National Development: A Gender Perspective", Dr Amy Tsanga, a senior law lecturer at the University of Zimbabwe's East and Southern Africa Women's Studies Centre, said the participation by men and women in national decision-making bodies was skewed in favour of men.

Schools and other institutions should be made more responsive to women, including ensuring that schools transform rather than reproduce prejudice and discrimination. This is according to the summary report of an e-discussion among NGOs and civil society groups about the interim report on achieving the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of universal primary education, which was prepared in early 2004 by the Millennium Project Task Force on Education and Gender Equality.

It is important to consider the needs, roles and skills of women in efforts to protect the environment, both in order to recognise the potential negative impacts of gender-blind policies on the livelihoods of women, and also because of the many ways that drawing on women's abilities and knowledge can increase the effectiveness of programmes. This is according to a paper by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) that calls for action, implementation, and for empowerment and encouragement of women's leadership.

End Violence against Women is an online resource that includes:
* a database of documents, reports, journal articles, training materials, posters, pamphlets and other resources related to violence against women.
* links to the latest news & events related to violence against women.
* an electronic newsletter, which is mailed out to members once or twice each month.

Association FEMINIAA and RNTC will organise a three-day workshop on 'The Use of the New Information and Communication Technology for Women Media Professionals in Africa'. The workshop will take place in Yaoundé, Cameroon. From 16th until 18th August 2004, 25 representatives of African women media organisations will come together to participate in the workshop.

Unemployment, low wages and sexual discrimination in the tiny kingdom of Lesotho have fueled an HIV infection rate of 50 percent among young women, the New York Times reports. Half of women aged 15 to 24 are infected with the virus, compared to 25 percent of men in the same age group. Overall, Lesotho's HIV prevalence among adults is 28 percent, higher than that of South Africa, which entirely surrounds it.

You can now sign the petition in support of women's rights using your mobile phone! Fahamu, the producers of Pambazuka News, have launched an initiative to rally mobile phone users to send SMS’s (Short Message Service/ text messages) in support of a petition for women’s rights in Africa. The petition is hosted on the Pambazuka News website and complements an existing online petition which has already collected nearly 500 signatures.

Mobile phone users in Africa and across the world can now send SMS’s from their mobile phones to sign an online petition in support of a campaign urging African governments to ratify the African Union’s Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa, which was adopted by the African Union on 11 July 2003. The Protocol offers significant protection for the rights of women in Africa, but has yet to receive the required number of country ratifications to come into force.

“To our knowledge, this is the first time that SMS technologies will have been used on a mass scale on the African continent in support of human rights,” said Firoze Manji, Director of Fahamu, a human rights organisation that developed the facility. “The facility enables those with poor on non-existent internet access to sign the online petition and takes advantage of the fact that there are nearly eight times more mobile phone users compared to email users in Africa.”

Initial testing of the SMS function indicates that it will be possible for mobile phone users to send SMS’s from many countries and mobile phone networks in Africa. “We cannot be certain that people in every country will be able to use this facility, but we think most should be able to,” said Manji.

HOW TO SIGN THE PETITION BY MOBILE/CELL PHONE

* Send a text message from your mobile/cell phone to: +27-832-933-934 with the message: petition your name

For example a message from Gertrude Emokor would say: petition gertrude emokor

HOW TO SUPPORT THE SMS PETITION

* Send text messages to your colleagues and friends alerting them to the petition and informing them how to sign by SMS. You can also use email and word of mouth to help spread the word.

* Distribute leaflets about this initiative. We want to reach people with mobile phones who might not have internet access. If you work in a human rights or social justice organisation in Africa, why not volunteer to distribute leaflets for us about the petition to your networks and contacts. Send your details to [email protected] and we will post you pamphlets to distribute.

FURTHER BACKGROUND

The target of the petition is the ratification and popularisation of the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa by African Governments. The Protocol covers a broad range of human rights issues and is a comprehensive legal framework that African women can use to exercise their rights. “Once it enters into force the Protocol will be a powerful new tool to achieve equal rights for women in Africa. It could well serve as a model for the rest of the world,” said Faiza Jama Mohamed, Africa Regional Director of Equality Now.

This initiative follows positive responses by African leaders during the recent African Union Executive Council and Assembly meetings in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to a campaign for the ratification of a protocol that enshrines the rights of women. The coalition is spearheaded by the women’s rights organisations Equality Now and FEMNET, together with Oxfam, Credo for Freedom of Expression and Associated Rights and Fahamu.

African countries have been slow to follow through. So far only three countries, the Comoros, Rwanda and Libya has ratified. Twelve more countries are required for the protocol to come into force. Echoing concerns about the lack of political will on the part of African countries to push forward with ratification, Mary Wandia of FEMNET noted, “Until it comes into force, the rights granted to women in the Protocol will simply remain hypothetical and the tedious lobbying efforts undertaken by civil society groups to ensure that the Protocol reflects a comprehensive list of rights for women will all be wasted.”

Africa currently has 52 million mobile phone users and figures indicate that the continent has caught on to the global SMS fad, with 450 million SMS messages sent in December 2002, compared to 350 million for December 2001, nearly a 30% increase in one year. As one of the fastest growing mobile phone markets, Africa is set to reach 67 million mobile phone users by the end of 2004.

PETITION DETAILS

1. Those wishing to SMS their support for the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa can do so by sending an SMS to +27-832-933934, with the word ‘petition’ and their name in their message. Senders will be charged the cost set by their network for sending an international SMS. People wishing to subscribe to free SMS alerts can sign up at http://www.pambazuka.org/petition/petition.php?id=1. The campaign will run until December.

2. The online petition can be signed at: http://www.pambazuka.org/petition/petition.php?id=1

3. Send questions and queries to [email protected]

4. Please note that not all mobile phones and networks in Africa will be compatible with this service and that Fahamu does not accept responsibility for failed messages.

* This initiative has been made possible through the support of the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada, and Oxfam GB.

In a bid to promote peace in Africa's conflict-ridden Great Lakes region, women parliamentarians from the area say they intend taking a more prominent role in talks to end fighting. This came during a two-day meeting, 'Peace, Security, Democracy and Development in the Great Lakes Region', which ended in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, July 16.

This paper addresses the gender element within Kenya's current PRSP document. The authors - the African Women's Development & Communication Network (FEMNET) - argue that there is no detailed cognisance of the gendered dimensions of the proposed policies, or anticipation of gender implications of the outcomes in reference to the different poverty dimensions. FEMNET attributes this to an inadequate exposure to gender issues. In order to address this the authors argue for appropriate tools that would show expected outcomes of addressing gender equality.

Female Genital Mutilation is practiced in 26 African countries, as well as some areas in the Middle East, Asia and South America. Although the practice is banned in most of these countries, it flourishes, with countries like Somalia where the FGM rate is nearly 100 percent, and Ethiopia where the rate is over 90 per cent. Rough estimates suggest that about half the women in Africa have undergone this rite. This is the introduction to the latest edition of the End Violence against Women newsletter that focuses on FGM. The newsletter is produced by the INFO Project at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Visit http://www.endvaw.org or sign up for this newsletter at http://www.endvaw.org/join.htm.

The consequences of liberalisation for women in the Cashew industry in Mozambique included job losses and subsequent impoverishment, and a decline in wages and conditions for remaining female employees, according to a report by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). The report makes a number of practically-oriented recommendations on how government can reduce poverty and improve outcomes for workers in the industry and emphasises the need to recognise that production, processing and commercialisation overlap, and therefore require integrated approaches which recognise the needs of women in the industry.

This publication was developed by Raising Voices in collaboration with UN-Habitat’s Safer Cities Programme. It emerged from the proceedings of the first supra-regional dialogue on GBV prevention held in Uganda in September 2003. It explores five key strategies of GBV prevention through practical examples of innovative projects from a variety of NGOs in the regions. It also summarizes key lessons learned in GBV prevention and includes an advocacy tool: The Kampala Declaration: Prevent GBV in Africa.

Developments in information and communication technologies (ICTs) run the risk of cutting women off from policy-making debates. Lack of literacy and mobility in male-dominated societies already constrain women's opportunities to be heard. At a time when it is widely recognised that promoting women's involvement in policies is crucial for reducing poverty, resource-poor women risk being further marginalised by their lack of access to ICTs.

In communities grappling with the devastating effects of Aids, women are quietly bearing the brunt, absorbing orphans into their existing families, caring for the ill and running their households.

AITEC, an organisation which seeks to advance ICT knowledge in Africa, is hosting a conference in Arusha, Tanzania, to promote and support the development of ICT as a tool of change and empowerment for women across Africa. The conference will be held on 5-7th August and AITEC's partners include the Government of Tanzania and the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).

Members of the National Union of Eritrean Women in Washington DC are organising a seminar during Festival Eritrea 2004. The seminar aims to enhance the unity of Eritrean Women and will be held on Saturday August 14th. More information is available on the link provided.

Organizers of a campaign that seeks to pressure African states into ratifying the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa are confident that they will achieve the required number of ratifications for the Protocol to enter into force by the end of the year.

This follows intensive lobbying during the recently ended African Union Executive Council and Assembly meetings in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, by a broad coalition campaigning for the ratification of the protocol. The coalition is spearheaded by Equality Now, Femnet, Oxfam, Credo for Freedom of Expression and Associated Rights and Fahamu. Fifteen ratifications are needed for the protocol to come into force.

Pambazuka News 162, the special edition produced by Fahamu in support of the campaign, was printed out and distributed in Addis Ababa. The edition featured prominently as a campaign tool in lobbying activities.

“It became a popular item at the Executive Council and also on the opening day of the summit. Anyone who could grab a copy did so. Through direct contacts and through the special issue of Pambazuka the activists reached a significant number if not all of the delegates present at the meeting. The activists also presented the special issue to the President of the Pan-African Parliament and AU commissioners urging them to support the campaign by attempting to influence the delegates in their various official capacities,” said a campaign report produced by Equality Now.

Meanwhile, the number of signatories to the online petition hosted on the Pambazuka News website continues to climb and has reached nearly 300. The petition remains active and supporters of the protocol are encouraged to sign.

Firoze Manji, Fahamu Director, said: “The African Union Executive Council and Assembly meetings have ended, but clearly pressure needs to be maintained in order to encourage African governments to ratify the protocol. We will therefore be continuing with the online petition so that people can voice their support for the ongoing campaign. We urge anyone who cares about the rights of women in Africa to immediately sign the petition.”

Fahamu is currently developing technologies to enable people to sign the petition using text-messaging (SMS). We hope to announce the launch shortly.

* Please click on the link below for the full report and details of national campaigns

After bearing the brunt of years of civil conflict, women in Angola require special attention and efforts to achieve equality, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) was told this week. Filomena Delgado, Angola's vice-minister for Family and Promotion of Women, said despite adverse conditions, steps had been taken to improve women's rights in the war-affected country: a state secretariat established in 1991 had been upgraded to a ministry in 1997 and the government had also taken "other initiatives to address the socioeconomic, legal and political aspects of gender parity".