Capacity building of women key for effective implementation of Gender Policy
Building the capacity of women and women’s civic organisations to actively participate and influence the administrative and political decision-making processes within communities and local government is key to the realisation of the Kusile Rural District Council (KRDC) Gender Action Plan.
This was said by Dorica Zulu, the Gender Focal Person at Kusile RDC during a Gender Policy Institutionalisation meeting conducted by Women’s Institute for Leadership Development (WILD) with Kusile RDC personnel.
The meeting was aimed at unpacking and discussing the implementation mechanisms for the Kusile RDC Gender Policy. The meeting was also a platform for generating consensus on operationalisation of the Policy and adoption of tools that will be used to measure implementation and translating the Policy into action.
Leading the exercise, Siphilisiwe Ncube a consultant and gender practitioner highlighted that the Kusile RDC Gender Policy responds to the gender equality provisions in the Constitution, the National Gender Policy and other international and regional gender equality framework needs.
“Adoption of the Gender Policy is good practice as gender mainstreaming is key for the attainment of gender equality. Gender mainstreaming is also important in the creation of an environment that is non-discriminatory with regards to access to resources, programs and information.”
“The Kusile RDC Policy is meant to promote gender responsiveness and equality in council administration as well as to ensure that line departments adopt a gendered approach to the planning and implementation of programs and projects,” highlighted Ncube.
Presenting on gender mainstreaming in the infrastructure development thematic area, Kelly Sibanda highlighted that only a few women are employed in construction as men are the ones who are mostly preferred as they possess the requisite qualifications and skill.
“Most women do not possess the requisite qualifications and skills when it comes to infrastructure development. There is need for capacity building in terms of trainings and short courses so that women can also obtain the requisite qualifications to qualify for these opportunities,” said Sibanda.
Presenting on gender mainstreaming in the thematic area on implementation of national projects, Gyson Mandikutse highlighted that the department is committed to creating a gender sensitive working environment especially by ensuring that the procurement processes are gender aware in order to ensure that women benefit equally from value contracts.
“The challenge that we are facing is that women are still side-lined due to attitudes that deem them not capable of contributing to national development projects. As a department we are working on implementing training programs that aim to change perceptions, attitudes and behaviours so that the status of women can be improved and gender equality can be achieved,” said Mandikutse.
The Acting CEO of Kusile RDC, Wellington Mthembo presenting on gender mainstreaming in the governance thematic area bemoaned the low representation of women in council as he highlighted that out of 28 councillors in Lupane district only 5 are women.
“Currently there are very few women in council but as council we have adopted a policy whereby, we ensure that whether the council chairperson is male or female, the vice council chairperson is a woman. We also ensure that women are chairpersons of council committees in a bid to ensure that inclusion of women in policy making processes becomes an integral part of planning, service delivery and development of policies,” said Mthembo.
In conclusion, the meeting delegates identified implementation plans on operationalisation of the Kusile RDC Gender Policy which include ensuring that gender issues are routinely considered in planning sessions as well as sensitisation meetings with other relevant stakeholders including community structures.