Some traditional council leaders in the Northern Region have received education on gender responsiveness aimed at improving women empowerment and inclusion in decision making processes in their respective communities.
Women are often left out and marginalized when it comes to taking decisions in the community or sometimes in the family without any regard to its socioeconomic impact on their livelihood.
To this end, the Girls to Women Foundation in partnership with Plan International Ghana has sensitized traditional council members and opinion leaders at Kasalgu in the Sagnarigu municipal.
The exercise is aimed at facilitating the inclusion of local women leaders (Magajia’s) in the traditional council under the Indigenous Women in Leadership project which is under the Women’s Voices and Leadership (WVL) program coordinated and funded by Plan International Ghana.
Executive Director of Girls to Women Foundation, Hajia Mariam Iddrisu in an exclusive interview said it is critical to involve women in decision making at all levels in order to ensure diversity of perspectives.
She argued women making up more than half of the country’s population and the world at large means their needs may not be fully taken into account when they are excluded from participating in decision making processes.
“Research has indicated that diversity in leadership can lead to a better organizational performance and better management of communities or even our households. When women are empowered, they are able to take care of their girl-children, they’re able to groom and nurture them to become responsible in the future” she said.
She emphasized it is therefore important to ensure that women are included in decision-making process at all levels to promote fairness, equity and better outcomes for all.
The Executive Director and Founder of the women led nongovernmental organization said the participants at the end of the workshop had a significant improvement in their leadership skills, confidence level and decision-making prowess.
“…We also achieved a number of significant milestones which were; instituting three-member gender committees in each of the traditional areas of implementation, again we had a 100 percent endorsement from all cabinet members to include Magajias in the traditional councils and to involve women in decision-making at all levels more especially in the communities they live” she stated.
Additionally, sixty selected women have also been trained on strategic leadership competence, qualities and confidence to be good leaders.
Meanwhile, the sustainable development goal 5 enjoins member nations to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls by 2030 and CSOs intervention puts Ghana on the right trajectory.
According to the UN, gender equality is not only a fundamental human right but a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. Therefore, women representation in political and economic decision-making processes will fuel sustainable economies and benefit societies and humanity at large.
