Source: The New Age Online
The only two women heads of state in Africa – Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Malawian President Joyce Banda – have just committed to using their positions to improve the lives of women across the continent.

Both Sirleaf and Banda have long championed women’s rights. And on April 29 in Monrovia, two years into what the African Union (AU) has declared the “Women’s Decade”, they pledged to work together to accelerate those efforts.

“Today is a day African women must rejoice,” Banda said as Sirleaf stood by her side. “This is our day. And this is our year. And this is our decade!” And Sirleaf affirmed her, and Liberia’s, commitment to empower women. “The two of us have great strength.

Together, we can do more to empower women and to ensure that the women’s role in society is enhanced.”

The challenges are great. Using the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) as a barometer, Liberia and Malawi generally score low in gender equality and women’s empowerment, education for girls, and maternal health.

But as Banda noted during her speech, there has never been a better time to advance women’s rights in Africa.

Sirleaf, a Nobel Peace prize winner, was elected as Africa’s first woman president in 2005 and reelected in 2011. While her first term in office focused on reconstructing a country devastated by two civil wars, between 1989 and 2003, she has set out to use her second term as president to make women’s rights and health a national priority.

Banda succeeded former president Bingu wa Mutharika after his sudden passing in April. After she was elected vice president in 2009, she had a falling out with Mutharika, and was subsequently expelled from the ruling Democratic People’s Party and barred from participating in government. However, she remained vice president, and in 2011 she formed the opposition People’s Party.

Both Sirleaf and Banda govern countries with significant development challenges. So devastating were Liberia’s civil wars that nearly a decade since the end of the conflict, the country is still in a state of reconciliation and reconstruction.

In Malawi, Mutharika’s last years in office were characterised by an economy crumbling under government mismanagement, which was compounded by the withdrawal of donor aid because of human rights abuses.

Yet despite the fact that Sirleaf has had to focus her efforts on reconstruction and Banda is barely one month into her time, there is evidence that both women have put the advancement of women at the top of their agendas.

Liberian Minister of Gender and Development Julia Duncan-Cassell said advances in women’s empowerment was observable through representation in government, as well as in ordinary women’s participation in the democratic process in Liberia.

On education, Duncan-Cassell said the ratio of girls enrolled in school continued to climb towards parity with boys. The 2010 UNDP report on Liberia and the MDGs confirms this. The document says that Liberia is on track to achieve its targets on girls’ education.

With regard to women’s health, Liberia’s five-year “Road Map”, launched in March last year, aims to “halve Liberia’s high rate of maternal and newborn death” and calls for “increasing the number of skilled birth attendants at all levels of the health care system by 50%.” According to the country’s 2007 Demographic and Health Survey, Liberia’s maternal mortality rate is 994 deaths for every 100000 live births – one of the highest in the world.

Banda too has already accomplished much for women since ascending to the presidency.

She has strengthened the voice of women in government through the appointment of eight women to senior cabinet positions. She has assigned women to the positions of deputy chief secretary to government and deputy director inspector general of police.

And she has advanced women’s economic empowerment through the introduction of an agricultural programme and a market initiative.

“Malawi’s maternal mortality rate is as high as 675 deaths per 100000 (live births),” Banda said. “As a woman president and a mother, it is my obligation to stop the deaths of women.”

Litha Musyimi-Ogana, head of the Women, Gender and Development Directorate for the AU, said: “It is wonderful news to hear that President Banda and President Sirleaf have prioritised the African Women’s Decade and have agreed to work together to advance women’s rights.”

She said on behalf of AU Commission head Jean Ping, the organisation pledged to make its resources available to Sirleaf and Banda, to accomplish the goals of the AU Women’s Decade.Meanwhile, Banda said she believed her responsibility for ensuring women’s rights extended beyond Malawi. “I know women in Africa still face many challenges due to HIV and Aids, poverty, conflict, and harmful cultural practices,” Banda said. “However, I firmly believe that you and I will tirelessly work together to make sure that women’s rights on the continent get better.”

Duncan-Cassell maintained that Banda’s rise to the presidency of Malawi was “a cause for celebration”. – IPS