By RUTH YAMBAYAMBA
Zambia Must Prosper Party (ZMP) is saddened that women in Zambia have continued to face various forms of marginalisation which in-turn hamper realisation of their full potential.
“What is even more worrying is that successive Governments including the current President Hakainde Hichilema’s UPND Government, have been paying lip service to the emancipation of women from all forms of oppression such as economic and political marginalisation.
In Zambia the HIV disease burden just like the crippling poverty are said to carry the face of a woman, a sad reference but a reality which has however not been taken seriously by Government to change the narrative through deliberate policies aimed at addressing the situation.
“Coupled to that is a struggling health sector beleaguered with shortages of medical supplies, equipment and staff which in-turn places a heavy burden on expectant women and others who take care of the sick in many households and health institutions,” party sposkesperson Trymore Mwenda has said.
Mr Mwenda, therefore, said a woman’s place in Zambia is one faced with challenges in accessing health care services especially in rural areas.
He said despite the country being over 58 years of independence, women in Zambia continue to die during child birth. Mr Mwenda also said, the gender based violence scourge has continued to claim many women and inflict untold misery as Government drags its feet onthe full implementation of the anti-GBV act of 2011 which contains progressive provisions like the establishment of the gender equity and equality commission.
On the economic front, he said, women continue to lag behind as most of the economic empowerment programs targeted at them offer very little to make a meaningful transformation to move them from the york of poverty to living decent lives. “In the agriculture sector women despite being the majority small scale farmers, producing the bulk of the country’s food continue to be sidelined and given meager inputs confining them to perpetual state of being unable to graduate to commercial farmer status.
As regards access to safe clean drinking water and sanitation services, women have to bear the blunt because these services are inadequate and non existent in many places forcing women to wake up early in the morning risking their lives and walk long distances to fetch water which may also not be safe clean drinking water especially in rural areas,” he said.
