EQUALITY FOR WOMEN IS PROGRESS FOR ALLIn commemoration of International Women’s Day, WFWP UK held an event at the Houses of Parliament in London, discussing the topic of equality. The first speaker was Professor Rosemary Sage who is a Trustee of the Charity EIMAN which predominantly empowers Muslim Women. However EIMAN also works with a wider audience of women to raise the awareness the Commission on the Status of Women which is a platform for gender equality and advancement of women. Rosemary is a qualified Speech and Language Therapist, Psychologist and teacher with experience in health and education fields. She stressed the importance of education and communication in helping ensure equality for all.The second speaker Princess Deun Adedoyin-Solarin is a Veteran Broadcaster & Media Personality with over 35years Professional Experience. For several years she hosted ‘Morning Ride’ the flagship talk-show on Nigerian Television. Princess ‘Deun is a real Yoruba Princess, the Granddaughter of HRM OBA William Christopher Adedoyin II, The Akarigbo of Sagamu, Remoland Ogun State, Nigeria; One of the few educated African Monarchs of his time. In other Voluntary capacities Princess ‘Deun serves on the Board of the Global Women Inventors & Innovators Network(GWIIN) as Operational Director for Media & Communication, where she leads on several national & international projects. She has also been recently appointed a Trustee of the Girl Child Network Worldwide (GCNW). During her presentation she drew upon her own experiences to drill in the importance of the love for each other. She spoke of the importance of helping one another and treating one another as you would want to be treated yourself. These values that are instilled in us by our parents should be utilised to help each other, only then will equality for women be achieved. In other words the freedom of a woman cannot be guaranteed until we help each other.Moreover Christa Rennie who is now a board member of WFWP UK and since 2006 she has been the General Secretary of WFWP UK. Previously she has done Social and Youth work in Australia and in the Caribbean (Missionary in Australia and the Bahamas). She then became the Regional Representative for the International Cultural Foundation in New York, USA, in New Delhi, India and in Colombo and Sri Lanka. In terms of her take on equality Christa argues that there are a few spheres where this needs to be adhered to, primarily there needs to be social equality, equality before the law and gender equality, only then will the full status and rights of women be restored. Christa called upon examples of women who had also previously challenged social constraints, a few being Mrs Barbour and Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst who are both ambassadors for change towards equality for women.Finally Betty Makoni is founder of Girl Child Network Worldwide. Recently she was selected to be in the team of experts for Preventing Sexual Violence Initiative to be officially launched by the UK Foreign Office and will be joining the team as a Gender Based Violence expert. Betty’s experiences shaped her to be the advocate and champion for girl’s rights that she is today. Orphaned at age 9, she grew up as one of the most poorest and marginalised African girls in the early 1980s and the education she attained up to degree level was through the Work For Your Education program where she became a child labourer at a middle girls` catholic school in Zimbabwe and it is this experience that shaped her to be the humanitarian she is today helping to rehabilitate over 70 000 girls who were sexually abused. Realising what she had done to empower herself as a poor girl , she went back into the poorest areas of Zimbabwe with a leadership and mentorship program that inspired, motivated and empowered over 350 000 girls in school based clubs. Today Girl Child Network is a modelreplicated in six African countries with her volunteer time to train, nurture and support many leaders. Betty gave a powerful presentation encouraging women to seek the reigns of empowerment for themselves, she uses who own example as a woman having achieved a lot for humanity and stresses that ‘gone are the times where women think they are born as victims’, it is time for change and equality should be demanded and reinforced.Report by Asmah Anis & photography by Keishin Hoshiko
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