Mon, 06 Mar 2017 10:10:53 +0000
Mr.President, observe womens rights and enhance their status-everywhere
| In the development process leading to our civilized society of today, there is a long dark period, universal in its coverage, discriminatory in its beliefs and in some cases, nauseating in the traditions and practices that have been accorded to women. In uplifting the lives of people in our political, economic, social l and cultural religious actions, every President, not just you the American President has a duty to bring to bear affirmative policies and actions that should favour women and see them develop to their fullest potential. |
Your starting point, Mr. President should be correcting the remarks you had made on women which came up during the campaign period. In my view, your apology over those remarks which made before you became President, would be generally accepted when your verbal apology is followed up or comes simultaneously with affirmative actions. One such action would be to appoint the women who qualify (and I know they are many in the USA) to key positions in your administration. I am confident in this suggestion that the influence of such a decision will be well received among Americans and its influence worldwide will go a long way in inspiring girls and young women in various nations.
The other action would be to appoint one of your daughters, Tiffany or any of her sisters as Goodwill Ambassador. The Goodwill Ambassador should go to some countries in all continents and address issues of inequality between men and women.
In her duties, she will be enhancing the work of the United Nations specialized Agencies, Regional and National Organizations in explaining women’s rights under existing international standards of equality as well as the legal instruments which are applicable in various countries and cultures ranging from the women’s rights as provided for in the United Nations Charter, to the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women.
There is no doubt that many countries and the media are bound to follow the words and actions of your daughter, the Goodwill Ambassador. I am confident that the Goodwill Ambassador will broaden the horizon of hope to women across the world, enhance the capacity for independent decision making in many women and help in changing the mindset in economic, political, social and cultural areas among women in communities, Government institutions including civil servants in various departments, non-Governmental organizations, private business companies and corporations and generally build up consciousness of the equal status of women in our societies.
More particularly, the Goodwill Ambassador should:
Inform women about their rights.
Increase the legal and general literacy of women.
Explain the meaning of social justice in their daily lives.
Explain human rights and women rights in detail to historical and contemporary societies.
Address gender issues.
No doubt some specific cultural traditions and religious beliefs and practices will require that the Goodwill Ambassador works with specific regional bodies and national community organizations in tackling issues and cases of such nature. Internationally, what has come out so strongly includes, but is not limited to:
Human rights of women in armed conflict- The dehumanizing factor of using women as a “weapon” in war, racial genocide, rape and many other human right violations.
Female refugees and their means of survival, as well as children.
Cultural practices commonly referred to as female genital mutilation.
The position of women in Islam.
Mr. President, I am writing to you from a nation that recently adopted a constitution along the lines of the USA when it comes to electing the President with a running mate. In our country, the Patriotic Front party elected President Lungu who in turn appointed Mrs. Inonge Wina as a running mate. When the Patriotic Front won the elections, Mrs. Wina became the first female Vice President since independence in 1964. I cannot overstate or understate the American influence in world affairs , the facts are there to speak for themselves.
I will be turning 60years old later this year. In our African tradition, Mr. President, I am not qualified to talk to you who is in the 70s about women as partners to men. But one of our traditional adage says, “Amano yafuna mwi fwea yaya muchulu” meaning, “knowledge can move from the small anthill into a big anthill”. From this stand point, I want to say, always treat women with the respect and dignity they deserve. In this statement, I am also supported by the Bible. In reality, the importance of our mothers stand out universally in the upbringing of our children. It is not by mistake that we refer to the language one has grown up speaking as a mother tongue and not a father tongue. Women deliver us into this world, a natural role that all of us in society should respect and cherish and give thanks to. Women’s partnership to men is Biblical to which I cannot add or subtract.
Mr. President, apart from the observance of human and women’s rights which I have referred to above, the language we use every day on women matters, the policies and actions of Government matter a lot in making men and women equal in our societies, in our lives as individuals and in shaping the future as we bequeath our practices to our children.
The world is yearning for positive influence. The USA has the power of that positive influence which will benefit many people in many nations. Mary Wollstonecraft in her writing ,1792 ,”vindication of the rights of women (regarded by many as feminist declaration of independence) wrote,” I lament that women are systematically degraded by receiving the trivial attentions which men think it manly to pay to the sex, when in fact, they are insultingly supporting their own superiority”. In the same text she poetically observe that,” in beauty’s empire is no mean, and woman, either slave or queen is quickly scorned when not adored.” Civilization has taught us the importance and virtue that every human being, man or woman, has for the development of our nations. We have a duty to march forward with civilization.
Donald Chanda -Lecturer,
University of Zambia (RTD),
P.O. Box 32379,
Lusaka
Tell: 0979-771803
Email: chakolongana@gmail.com
