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SA parly delegation in Zimbabwe
04 Jul 2023 at 02:05hrs | Views
A delegation from South Africa's KwaZulu Natal Legislature Multi-Party Women's Caucus is in Zimbabwe on a week-long benchmarking visit with their counterparts in Zimbabwe Women's Parliamentary Caucus.
Head of the South African delegation, Ms Celiwe Madlopha, said their visit was meant to exchange notes on women empowerment in Zimbabwe and progress in ensuring that women ascend to leadership positions in various spheres of life.
"We are coming here to benchmark with our colleagues from the Zimbabwe Women's Parliamentary Caucus to try and see what they are doing because we believe as Africans, we must start at home when we are benchmarking so that we consolidate the good practices that we are doing with regards to women empowerment.
"Our issue as women across the world is the issue of women representation in different decision-making structures and as a result of that we are trying to employ different tactics from all the women caucuses in different countries," she said.
During their visit, the South African delegation will check on the successes of the ZWPC, their challenges and what they were doing to overcome those challenges.
"We also want to see where we can assist each other as women's caucuses. One of our mandates is to support each other," said Ms Madhlopa.
Deputy Chairperson of the ZWPC Ms Sibusisiwe Budha-Masara welcomed the visit by the South Africans, saying it would offer an opportunity for them to learn.
"I would like to appreciate the exchange programme between the Parliament of Zimbabwe and the KZN and we hope to learn from them in areas they are doing good and we will borrow a leaf and there are also areas that we thought we had done nothing, but now see that we have done a lot, especially in terms of gender equality, with the introduction of the youths' quota in Parliament and the women's quota in local government, which will offer an opportunity to groom women leaders," she said.
Ms Budha-Masara said they would continue to call for 50-50 percent representation of women and men in leadership positions.
Head of the South African delegation, Ms Celiwe Madlopha, said their visit was meant to exchange notes on women empowerment in Zimbabwe and progress in ensuring that women ascend to leadership positions in various spheres of life.
"We are coming here to benchmark with our colleagues from the Zimbabwe Women's Parliamentary Caucus to try and see what they are doing because we believe as Africans, we must start at home when we are benchmarking so that we consolidate the good practices that we are doing with regards to women empowerment.
"Our issue as women across the world is the issue of women representation in different decision-making structures and as a result of that we are trying to employ different tactics from all the women caucuses in different countries," she said.
"We also want to see where we can assist each other as women's caucuses. One of our mandates is to support each other," said Ms Madhlopa.
Deputy Chairperson of the ZWPC Ms Sibusisiwe Budha-Masara welcomed the visit by the South Africans, saying it would offer an opportunity for them to learn.
"I would like to appreciate the exchange programme between the Parliament of Zimbabwe and the KZN and we hope to learn from them in areas they are doing good and we will borrow a leaf and there are also areas that we thought we had done nothing, but now see that we have done a lot, especially in terms of gender equality, with the introduction of the youths' quota in Parliament and the women's quota in local government, which will offer an opportunity to groom women leaders," she said.
Ms Budha-Masara said they would continue to call for 50-50 percent representation of women and men in leadership positions.
Source - The Herald
