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6 March 2009

Programme director
Premier Mbulelo Sogoni
Political Party and Government leaders from all spheres
Staff of the Provincial Gender Machinery
The People of the Eastern Cape
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen

In two days South Africa will be joining other countries in the world to celebrate the International Women's Day. This day is observed globally every year to look back to many struggles waged by women for their empowerment and gender equality and renew their resolve to overcome outstanding challenges to their freedom advancement and full emancipation.

I am delighted to be one of your guests at this event organised jointly by the Provincial Legislature and the Provincial Gender Machinery. I appreciate the opportunity to share with you my thoughts as part of our collective in Cabinet, on how we have performed as a country in taking forward the struggle for gender equality and women's empowerment.

I consider myself privileged to have served in this government that has made the emancipation of women the cornerstone of our transformation agenda. We believe, as Nelson Mandela declared some few years ago, that our country cannot be free of our painful past when over 25 million of our citizens who are women are still subjected to all forms of oppression, discrimination, exploitation, repression and abuse.

We are grateful to women and, of course, men whose selfless courage in the struggle for our freedom has now placed our country on course for the achievement of a non-racial and non-sexist society. We should use this occasion today to commemorate the memory of those great patriots many of whom are not with us today. We think of women like Charlotte Maxeke, Ray Alexander, Lillian Ngoyi, Kate Molale, Ma Tambo, Miriam Makeba and Helen Suzman, to name but a few.
The International Women's Day is a constant reminder that women’s role is not a fringe theatre in the struggle for the liberation of all humanity which can only be considered as an afterthought. After all, women's preoccupation is always the welfare of others, their partners, children and their families. They often strive to improve the lot of everyone else, no matter what it takes. They are prepared to sacrifice their own needs. Women are always at the centre of creating A Better Life for All!

When we succeed in achieving full gender equality and a comprehensive empowerment of our women, this will have a positive effect in our society as women constitute the majority of the poor and those without access to education, healthcare and other social services. The oppression and exploitation of women is intertwined with challenges of discrimination and exclusion we face in our society which are based on race, class, ethnicity, age, religion and culture. We must, today, reject any belief that a woman's place is in the kitchen, because women are everywhere where everybody is.

Ladies and gentlemen

Over the last fifteen years our country has experienced a profound transformation on the gender front, thanks to our Constitution. The laws we have enacted and other interventions we have effected were meant to affirm and empower our women and help give them opportunities as we march towards a non-sexist society.

We have various laws in place which address issues of traditional leadership, succession, land and property ownership, which have drastically changed the lot of our rural women. The workplace has also been shaken to protect the rights of workers, especially those in the farms and the domestic sector where the majority are women. The progress we have attained in the provision of access to social grants, clean water, education, health care and civic participation, have impacted positively on the lives of many of our women.

We have been consistent in our determination, including the allocation of resources, to rid our society of gender-based violence. Our integrated, multi-sectoral approach continues to build the necessary capacity we need as a country to combat this social scourge and raise public awareness about it.

The 365 Days National Plan of Action to End Gender Violence and the annual 16 Days of Activism Campaign on Violence against Women and Children have helped mobilise our people for our moral regeneration and building a caring society.
Our Equality courts and dedicated Sexual Offences courts as well as the Victim Empowerment programmes, have all given a strong gender-sensitive dimension to our criminal justice system.

We are proud that when only 16 percent of the world's ministerial positions were held by women in 2008, in our country women had 43 percent representation in our Cabinet. When the global proportion of parliamentary seats held by women in 2008 averaged some 18 percent, our country had 33 percent women contingent in our legislature, this figure being above the target set by the Southern African Development Community (SADC).

The 40 percent women representation we have in our local government councils is on course to achieve the gender parity which is our objective. We have also surpassed the 30 percent target we had set for ourselves for women representation in senior management positions in our Public Service. I am also proud to say that the last National Conference of the ruling party set a higher bar of 50 percent women in structures of the organisation. As a result this country is going to move faster towards attaining gender parity as adopted by the African Heads of State of the African union.

In this province, we have achieved a significant increase in the profile of women's equity issues in various government programmes such as the Female Farmer of the Year and in social grants and the housing we provide. The Provincial Government, among others, also prioritises women-owned companies in procurement in all departments, business opportunities created in the construction sector, the provision of bicycles as well as in the learnership and internship programmes.

We are also pleased that the support we provide to Queens in this Province makes an important contribution to empowerment of people on the ground and the strengthening of structures of our Local Government.

Programme Director,

These achievements should not render us complacent, but instead enhance our determination to build a truly non-sexist society. We should pursue the policy of gender equality in all areas of human endeavour; in homes, churches and workplaces.

While we have a high level of political will among our leaders, a well oiled National Gender Machinery, and gender mainstreaming integrated into our development planning processes, many challenges still lie ahead. The Global Gender Gap Report of 2008 which measures the size of the gender gap in 130 countries has shocking news for us.

Our country is ranked number 22, which is below the ranking for our two neighbours, Mozambique and Lesotho which are at 18 and 16 respectively. This Report is a clear message to us that we should intensify our effort to close the gender gap in the areas of economic participation and opportunity, health and survival, educational attainment, and political empowerment.

Even though we have met many of the targets we had set for ourselves, what we want as an ultimate objective is to attain full gender parity in our factories, schools, government offices, legislatures and Cabinet, as I have indicated earlier.
The Fifteen Year Review and our country progress report on the Millennium Development Goals have revealed some critical gaps that require urgent attention. If we are to succeed in our efforts to advance the cause of our women in education, employment and the provision of health care, for instance, the next Administration must increase its focus – including state resources – on obstacles that have been identified.

Illiteracy rates among women are still higher than among men; HIV and AIDS prevalence among young women is at an intolerable level; and a high proportion of our women are house wives and domestic workers. While we pride ourselves of achieving over 30 percent representation of women in our Parliament, other countries such as Rwanda and Sweden are approaching 50 percent. We must also get this target at all spheres of legislative and executive institutions.

In some of our provinces, including the Eastern Cape, the main challenge is in putting in place measures to quantify the impact on women’s equity on the ground through a comprehensive monitoring and evaluation system, including a wide range of development indicators.

Ladies and gentlemen,

The current economic crisis has introduced an additional burden on our ability to address the challenges we have to overcome in order to achieve gender equality. Many governments across the world, including our own, are compelled to tighten their belts and reprioritise items on their budgets. We intend to ensure that this does not affect the allocation of resources that are necessary for addressing the plight of our women.

As we prepare for the next Administration that will lead our country for the next five years, we need to strengthen the unity that we have demonstrated in the organisation of this event. It is encouraging to see that our political parties are so united today even though they have been at each other’s throats in their election campaigns. Maybe now that more and more women are coming into politics, we should also begin to change the culture of politics to a more humane one. Because we are political rivals we do not need to act like enemies.
We need to work together if we are to prevail over obstacles before us. Here in the Eastern Cape, which is largely a rural province, advancing of the cause of women is inseparable from addressing the challenges of rural human development in the spheres of infrastructure, job creation and food security.

We will have to learn from the experience we have accumulated as a Province over the past fifteen years as we heighten our programmes in eradicating the legacy of apartheid and the Bantustan system it created. There has also been discussion at the national level regarding measures that are needed to strengthen our National Gender Machinery. One proposal still receiving attention is the possibility of establishing a dedicated ministry for women affairs and gender equality.

We need a stronger hand in directing government policies as well as in efforts and resources towards ensuring that poverty which is associated mainly with women – is eradicated. We must speed up the delivery of tangible changes in the lives of ordinary women in villages and urban squatter settlements.
The next five years will build on the lessons and achievements of the last fifteen years.

Programme Director,

As we move forward, we will continue to link our efforts to the cause and struggles of women on our continent and other parts of the world. Our solidarity and active support for women in places such as Iraq, Palestine, the Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Guinea Bissau is informed by own struggle which made the freedom we enjoy today possible.

Today as we celebrate the International Women's Day, we have in mind those women in many parts of the world who are receiving flowers and other gifts from their relatives. But we are also thinking of women who are displaced because of wars, those in refugee camps, and many more who are making ends meet in farms, townships, and informal settlements.

This day belongs to all of us; the cause of the struggle for women emancipation belongs to the whole of humanity. The International Women's Day was born out of struggles of women workers in United States of America. Today it resonates with all circumstances that women refuse to tolerate forever. It is an opportunity to take stock of our lot and to mobilise ourselves to never give up the fight towards the best life has to offer to us and the rest of humankind.

Malibogwe igama lamakhosikazi!

I thank you!

Issued by: The Presidency
6 March 2009
Source: The Presidency (http://www.thepresidency.gov.za)