More efforts would be required to improve women and girl’s participation in decision-making processes at the community and household levels, Mr. Raphael Godlove Ahenu, the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Global Media Foundation (GLoMeF) has said.
GLoMeF is a Sunyani-based human rights and media advocacy NGO working to improve the general well-being of the vulnerable and underprivileged in society.
Mr Ahenu said the foundation and its partners as well as other civil society organisations including Plan Ghana International were working to promote quality education, health and tackling other social issues such as poverty, and forced and child marriages.
He said there was a need for the nation to prioritize these needs and empower women and girls to participate in decision-making by giving them a voice to be heard at the community and household levels.
Mr Ahenu made the call, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) on the sidelines of separate local-level advocacy sessions on women’s participation in decision-making, held at Nwowasu, Yawsae, Sofokrom, Keyeremehkrom and Kyerebogya, farming communities in the Sunyani Municipality.
Mr Ahenu said women, though are the majority in most societies, were often left out in making decisions that sometimes affected their wellbeing at the community and household levels.
The GLoMeF organised the advocacy sessions under its Plan Ghana International support project dubbed “Women’s Innovation for Sustainable Enterprises” (Wise) project, being funded by Global Affairs Canada.
It aimed at deepening the knowledge of the about 1500 men and community members to better understand women’s rights and appreciate the importance of women participation in household and community levels in decision-making.
The four-year project, with 2023 being the last year of implementation, and URBANET and WIDO, other NGOs sought to enhance economic empowerment, well-being and inclusive economic growth for women in Ghana.
Mr Ahenu said there was the need for interventions in the country to target promoting women’s decision-making power at the household and community levels.
In a highlight, Madam Rose Aawulenaa, the WISE Project Manager, explained that WISE “is a women’s economic empowerment project seeking to promote innovative, integrated and gender transformative business services”.
The project does this by improving women’s agencies to exercise decisions regarding their participation in economic growth as well as increasing productivity, profitability, and innovation.
Mad Aawulena said taking decisions without involving women at the household and community levels ought to be stopped.
