Experts attending a two-day Commonwealth-sponsored ‘Women’s Leadership Advocacy Meeting’ in Dar es Salaam on Wednesday called on Tanzania to increase women leaders in all sectors of society.
Tanzania, like many other countries, was seen as having not done enough to ensure women become leaders in public and private sectors.
Chief Executive Officer of the Institute of Directors in Tanzania Said Kambi acknowledged that Tanzania has made a big stride in women advancement by creating an enabling environment.
However, he said that Tanzania’s legal and policy systems do not sufficiently help and prepare women to become leaders and called for their reform to truly deepen leadership gender diversity in public and private sectors.
He said reforms were also necessary to help society do away with traditions that hamper women advancement and stand in their way to achieve education and realise their dreams.
Kambi said Tanzania was keen to industrialise but cautioned that the objective would be hard to achieve without close cooperation between men and women.
The Head of the Tanzania’s Women Bank, Margret Chacham, said cumulative success will mainly depend on how focused women are at personal level. “The obstacles aside, a women at place of work must prove to society that she makes a leader.”
The meeting was jointly organised by the Commonwealth and Ministry of Health, Community Development, Gender, Elders and Children. It was opened by the ministry’s Permanent Secretary, Shaba Nkinga who reiterated government’s commitment to women advancement. The Commonwealth has organised similar meetings in Uganda, Kenya, Nigeria, Malaysia and Britain.
Malaysia LeadWomen Sdn Bhd CEO, Anne Abraham said women leaders were needed the world over, but the point here is not to have women leaders for its own sake, rather it is to have quality women who are as able as men.”
She said despite the fact that the world was very positive on women advancement, at global level too few women were becoming leaders accusing anti-women traditions standing in their way. The UN wants to achieve 50-50 gender equality in leadership by 2030.
Uganda’s Sarah Kitakule, Adviser, Gender and Economic Development, said at family level boys and girls must be treated equally to deepen gender parity in future.
Source: The Guardian, Tanzania
