RESOURCES SHARING: HEED CALLS ON GENDER EQUALITY

In what is bound to be a historic development in Tanzania, Africa and much of the rest of the world, President Samia Suluhu Hassan has committed her government to “empowering” women on land-related issues.

As part of wider efforts to functionally and effectively champion women’s rights in the name of justice and gender equality, President Hassan has solemnly pledged to ensure that women in Tanzania readily access “economic rights and justice”.

All this is as per the agenda that was agreed upon at the Generation Equality Forum (GEF) that was concluded in Paris, France, on July 2, as well as the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action on Women adopted at the Fourth UN World Conference on Women in Beijing, China, on September 15, 1995.

In effect, the government will be out and out to ensure that, for example, women in Tanzania would have been empowered to own land and other economically productive resources by 2026.

In a sense, then, the Forum in Paris brought together representatives from across the world bent on fostering gender equality by empowering women as a matter of course.

One way of effectively doing this would be to scale up the commitments to women development that were made at the 1995 Beijing Women Conference – doing so by, among other measures, setting up the appropriate platforms for action.

Fortunately, Tanzania is already on course in implementing the measures needed in this.

The Minister for Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation, Ms Liberata Mulamula, said last week that “the government will ensure that women can own land and other productive resources – as well as transform their (currently) informal economies (economic activities) to formal ones.”

President’s pledge

This, the minister reminded one and all, was in a pledge made by Tanzania’s Head of State to the UN Under Secretary General-cum-Executive Director of the UN Women, Dr Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, when the two met in Dar es Salaam on May 28 this year.

In the event, President Hassan stressed her desire “to champion women’s economic justice and human rights” – especially in land ownership and empowering women in the economy.

To that very noble end, Ms Mulamula stressed that the President Hassan government “will make sure that women own land, and are elevated to the formal economy… Therefore, it is important that we join hands with the international community in empowering women” as a matter of fact.

Fair enough – and kudos for all this, we say to the government. Land ownership by women in many Third World countries has for far too long been traditionally frowned upon in society, and moves to change that are most welcome, indeed.

Also most welcome will be measures to bury the proverbial hatchet in the gender conflicts stakes, thus making it possible for women to equally enjoy the same rights and freedoms that seem to be confined to men by tradition and other shackles.

Hence the need to revisit extant policies and regulatory frameworks soonest, aligning them with the proposed gender equality-related improvement reforms.