africa: where are the women?

Gender equality has been given high priority in both the African Union (AU) charter and the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad)principles. However, as the AU sat in its inaugural session, all the African leaders present (a few of the 52 countries were represented by their foreign ministers) at the International Convention Centre in Durban were men. Of all the African foreign ministers, only two are women: Nkosazana Zuma of South Africa and Lilian Patel of Malawi.