Southern Sudanese women rights activists want donors to focus on issues affecting women during a meeting in Norway Monday and Tuesday to consider an appeal for billions of dollars in reconstruction aid.
The group said donors being asked to contribute to the development of Sudan after more than two decades of north-south war that ended in January should realize that protecting and enhancing the rights of females was critical to ensuring the new-found peace.
– We need women to participate in all affairs of the country, said Kezia Layinwa Nicodemus, the commissioner for Gender and Child Welfare with the ex-rebel Sudan People Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A).
– We spell out clearly that women need education, good laws to govern them … education is everything, without this women cannot go far, added she.
In addition to education for girls, Nicodemus and others said reconstructing the south and improving infrastructure in the rest of the country would depend heavily on the political, economic and legal empowerment of women.
– Signing the peace agreement does not just end the war or reduce the loss of property, we have post-war challenges which women reflect and will be taken to Oslo, said Anisia Achieng, the chair of the Sudan Womens Voice for Peace.
– We are participating in Oslo for the ownership of our participation which has to be implemented, she said.
– We see the donors conference as an opportunity where Sudanese women can articulate their critical issues for reconstruction and a space where they can participate as citizens to find the future of their country, said Nyaradzai Gumbonzvanda, a senior official with the UN womens agency UNIFEM.
The donor-meeting in Oslo gather some 60 delegates including UN chief Kofi Annan, Sudanese Vice President Ali Osman Taha, SPLM/A leader John Garang and ministers from bilateral and multilateral donors like the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.
They are looking at an assessment that says Sudan needs nearly eight billion dollars (six billion euros) for reconstruction and development over the next two years to recover from the north-south civil war.
The international community is being asked to fund about 2,6 billion of that with the rest coming from Sudans own resources, particularly oil revenue, according to the assessment which was released in early March.
The war in southern Sudan claimed at least 1,5 million lives and displaced another four million but the peace accord that ended it did not include the current conflict in the countrys troubled western Darfur region.
Kilde: The Push Journal
