Samoa's Prime Minister Tuilaepe Sailele is set to push constitutional amendments through Parliament to create special seats for women.
Under the changes, at least five seats - or ten percent - of the members of parliament will be female.
Read the complete story at Radio Australia News, published on January 5, 2012.
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The Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD) will hold the first ever Asia Pacific Feminist Forum (APFF) on 12-14 December 2011 in Chiang Mai, Thailand. This event will bring together 100-150 activists- women lawyers, academics, advocates and youth leaders. It will be an occasion to celebrate our collective achievements, reflect on our challenges and political climates, deepen feminist knowledge and analysis, strengthen our sisterhood, solidarity and collaboration, and reaffirm our resolve to advance women’s rights.
Workshops:
Workshops will be divided into four categories:
1. Knowledge building: to share new scholarship, analysis, and understandings in key areas of challenges confronting the women’s movement in the region
2. Skills building: to share successful strategies and skills in advocacy for reform
3. Movement building: to share successful efforts at building our movement across nations or regions. Discussions on what has worked for the movement.
4. Our well-being: Massage, dance, songwriting workshops, and other creative workshops for our well-being
Find more information at this link.
The Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD) will hold the first ever Asia Pacific Feminist Forum (APFF) on 12-14 December 2011 in Chiang Mai, Thailand. The APFF will bring together women activists, lawyers, academics, advocates and youth leaders to celebrate our collective achievements, reflect on our challenges and shifting political environments, deepen feminist knowledge and analysis, strengthen our sisterhood, solidarity and collaboration and reaffirm our resolve to advance women’s rights.
For more information visit the APWLD website.
Workshops will focus on:
1. Knowledge building: to share new scholarship, analysis, and understandings in key areas of challenges confronting the women’s movement in the region.
2. Skills building: to develop strategies and practical skills that can aid women’s rights advocacy.
3. Movement building: to strengthen collaboration across nations or regions and build new movements that reflect current challenges.
4. Our Well-being: Massage, dance, song writing workshops, and other creative workshops for our well being.
Samoa's newly re-elected prime minister has raised the ire of Pacific feminists by claiming one female MP in his cabinet is "more than enough". Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi swore in his 13-members cabinet over the weekend after winning a comfortable majority in the March 4 election. The leader had an elected group of two women and 34 men to select from, and said his final mix of one female minister and 12 male in cabinet got the gender balance "just right". But Fiji-based women's rights group Femlink said the prime minister clearly misunderstood the goal of gender equality.
For more information, please visit: TheSydneyMorningHerald
“Women are leaders, innovators and givers. They are scientists, teachers and nurturers. They have vision, compassion and the will to improve their communities, which, in turn, brings change on a global scale."
Meanwhile, the Queen, in her Commonwealth Day message, noted 26 million girls are born every year across the 54 member nations.
Despite all the advancements women have made and the accomplishments they’ve achieved, she suggested more could be done to ensure they play an “even larger role” in society.
“The commendable goal is to create a greater opportunity for women as children and adults to pursue their hopes and dreams, to attain their goals, and to make best use of their talents and knowledge,” she said.
To read the complete news please visit The Gazette.
AS the world marks International Women’s Day tomorrow, a new guide aimed at providing policy-makers and advocates with ideas on how to promote more women in Pacific legislatures was launched in the Pacific.
The Guide was launched by the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat and the United Nations Development Programme Pacific Centre. Secretary-General of the Forum Secretariat, Tuiloma Neroni Slade, said in the Guide’s Foreword that “in the long-term, it is important that we continue to work with our Pacific communities to build greater recognition of the role that women can and should play as national leaders, including as members of our Pacific legislatures”.
