Zim crisis: Women as solution holders
WOMEN have for a long time been sidelined in key decision and leadership processes, and with Zimbabwe having its fair share of challenges, very few platforms have been created to allow women to freely, actively and fully contribute to how the country can come out of its current mess.
In light of this, Women’s Academy for Leadership and Political Excellence (Walpe) held a virtual meeting titled The Zimbabwean Crisis: Women as Solution Holders, What needs to be done?
The discussion brought together vibrant and renowned gender justice and women’s rights activists who discussed in depth the social, economic, political, environmental and health challenges currently haunting the nation.
The meeting was an inaugural consultative discussion process on how women can equally contribute in defining and proffering solutions to the challenges affecting the country.
The virtual meeting consisted of a panel which comprised a Member of Parliament, young women from civil society organisations, regional and international gender justice activists. The meeting kicked off with submissions from the panellists as they unpacked the Zimbabwean crisis.
In their submissions, Namatai Kwekweza a youth activist and Mantate Mlotshwa a social justice activist raised concerns over the upsurge in human rights violations, especially targeting women human rights defenders and activists.
They demanded justice for women victims of abuse and torture.
They also emphasised the need for broader national processes that involve women in coming up with solutions to the current challenges facing the nation.
In her submission, Nangamso Kwinana, an advocate for human rights, justice and freedom in South Africa, encouraged women to contribute to ideas that strengthen human rights, justice and freedom in Zimbabwe and beyond its borders.
Legislator Priscilla MisihairabwiMushonga emphasised the need for intergenerational discussions where women of all ages come together and proffer solutions to the challenges bedevilling the country.
She highlighted that Zimbabwean women should be able to define their own issues in the form and nature they understand from their own lived experiences.
Rumbidzayi KwandawasvikaNhundu, a gender equality and human rights advocate, said women should critique male privilege, male patriarchal entitlements versus empowerment of women and be able to come up with holistic solutions that help in overcoming the current challenges facing the country.
Follow-on similar discussions shall be held in all the 10 provinces, where women in the rural and urban areas shall be engaged so that they also contribute in proffering solutions to the current impasse whose implications are being felt by women and girls more.
Walpe shall produce a position paper at the end of the engagement process to be used to engage political parties, Parliament, government, Sadc, African Union and other regional and international human rights institutions on the Zimbabwean situation from a women’s rights perspective.