PAYOWI Among Many Women Goups Attending Big Women’s Conference In Ganta, Liberia

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GANTA, Nimba County, Liberia- The Paramount Young Women Initiative (PAOWI) is among a number of women’s rights organizations attending 9th women’s movement consultative conference here in this northeastern Liberian city.

The institution is being represented at this conference by Garmah Lomo, who proxied for the Executive Coordinator Atty. Facia B. Harris in the two-day conference which is being held under the theme: Bridging the Gap Fostering Women’s Solidarity, peace building and Inclusion.”

The conference was held in Gompa City, Nimba County with Sponsorships from Kvinna Kvinna, RFSU, Forum (CIV), Medica Liberia, Care, Sweden Sverige, UN Women, Action Aid and Plan international.

KVINNA Till KVINNA foundation, a Swedish based International Organization who has collaborated with her partner organizations which goal is organize women’s movement Building Conference, Unite women in Liberia with goal to unite women to identify barriers to fostering solidarity amongst women, build a stronger women’s movement and address critical challenges of intersectionality, solid arity and movement building to advance gender equity. They believe women’s participation in decision making is fundamental to increasing their power and contributing to democratic peaceful progress.

Other partners include Women NGO Secretariat of Liberia, Humanity Care Liberia, Women Rights Watch, Liberia National Rural women rights structure and Raise Bar amongst several others.

However, United Nations Human Rights office of the High Commissions, Medica Liberia, Sweden Sverige, Plan International, Forum CIV and RFSU are donors for the ongoing program.

Making a special remark at the program, the Country Director of KVINNA KVINNA Aisha Lai said, this year women’s movement building conference will enable the women of Liberia to take collective actions to engage more extensively at local and national levels to

Create a stronger women’s movement in Liberia that can address challenges faced by women, break down barriers and strategize ways of uniting in sisterhood.

The women’s movement conference also aimed to promote solidarity and advocate for increasing women’s participation movement building, promoting women in leaderships, promoting gender equality while also addressing Gender based violence and other forms of discrimination against women including as well as other issues affecting women in Liberia which together will advance peace peacebuilding processes amongst others.

According to KVINNA KVINNA Country Director, the first consultative meeting United Women in Liberia was held in April 2015 followed by subsequent consultative meetings where women came together to discuss relevant issues affecting women’s movements in Liberia. Since then, there have been eight consultative meetings held with various themes such as “How to unite women in Liberia”, “Values and principles”, Cultural sensitivity as an Approach/Method to Unite Women in Liberia”, Unity of women’s in Liberia: Roles and Cultural considerations, Integrity linked to the unity of women and integrity, culture and diversity towards strengthening Unity to name a few.

KVINNA KVINNA Country Director making remarks.

She called on the women of Liberia attending the two conference to speak out what affecting them because this conference is forum created for them to bring out everything affecting them.

Also speaking at the conference was, Fenny Louise Taylor who prexy for the Executive Director of Medica Liberia Mis. Yah V. Parwon who said, the ongoing two days women’s conference is both vital and timely.

Madam Taylor added that the Movement building reminds them that there is power in numbers.

As our national anthem states, “In union strong, success is sure.” We must work together to bring about change in every sphere she indicated.

She further that, At Medica Liberia, we believe that collaborative effort is crucial in advancing and protecting the rights of women and girls in Liberia.

Currently, we are analyzing the government’s expenditure on SGBV (Sexual and Gender-Based Violence) cases. Our findings reveal limited funding for essential SGBV services such as safe homes, one-stop centers, and legal support.

The Medica Liberia senior staff revealed that These services heavily depend on donor funding, making them vulnerable to changes in donor priorities. Consequently, these vital services are only abandoned, under-resourced or partially functioning.

She narrated that their policy brief calls on the government to prioritize and take ownership of these services to ensure their sustainability.

This is why this conference is so important to us. We need a collaborative effort to address and change this situation. This is a problem that affects us all, whether we are survivors of SGBV or not. Violence against one woman is violence against us all.

However, she hoped that they take away from this conference the imperative to work together, address issues collectively, and create an inclusive, diverse, and strong women’s movement and must ensure that the needs of women and girls, in every walk of life and location, are addressed and met.

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