RUNDU – The Ministry of Gender Equality and Child welfare is currently conducting an induction workshop on the implementation of the coordination mechanism for the national gender policy at regional level.
The week-long workshop which started on Monday in Rundu is being attended by delegates from Kavango West, Kavango East and Zambezi regions.
Early this year in April, Cabinet approved the coordination mechanism for the implementation of the National Gender Policy in Namibia and it is against this background that the gender ministry undertook the workshop.
Speaking on behalf of the Minister of Gender Equality and Child Welfare, Rosalia Nghidinwa, her PS Erastus Negonga stated: “As you may be aware, Cabinet at its meeting of April 2014 approved the coordination mechanism for the implementation of the national gender policy in Namibia. Cabinet further directed that all the affected stakeholders should fully support the coordination mechanism in all their policies, programmes, plans, budgets, implementation and monitoring as well as the evaluation process.”
Speaking at the same event the mayor of Rundu, Hilka Wayera Leevi, said Namibia has policies designed to improve living conditions of all Namibians.
“And after implementation we can then monitor and evaluate whether they were effective or not,” she said.
“I understand the aim of this workshop is to establish the regional gender permanent task force which is of course a step ahead to operationalise the implementation of the national gender policy with all stakeholders at regional level,” Leevi noted.
She urged delegates to bring about changes that will lead the regions to achieving the goal of Vision 2030, where all men and women will enjoy equal rights and realise their full potential in contributing to the socio-economic development of the country.
Leevi applauded the leadership of the ministry for hosting the workshop.
According to Nghidinwa, the only approach which will enable the government and other stakeholders to implement the national gender policy and gender-based violence plan of action to all structures of society is to have a gender responsive budget.
Furthermore Nghidinwa told participants:
“We all know that gender is a cross-cutting issue and there is no way we can achieve gender equality if it is not spread across all sectors to ensure that men and women, boys and girls are all equally cared for and benefit from services offered by all sectors of our society.”
A National Gender Permanent Task Force is to oversee the effective overall implementation of the national gender policy and its plans of action and to ensure that the gender coordination mechanism structure is also fully operational at regional and local levels across all sectors.
By John Muyamba