The EAC-GIZ-EASSI Gender week in focus

The East African Community Secretariat (EAC) in collaboration with German Agency for International Co-operation (GIZ), East African Sub-Regional Support Initiative (EASSI) and Arusha Municipality have jointly organized a series of activities to mark Gender Week from 5-9 March, 2012 in Arusha, Tanzania. The event coincides with the World International Women’s Day on 8^th March and linked to the United Nation’s Secretary General’s Campaign to End Violence Against Women UNiTE on 9^th March.

This event will bring to focus the critical need to end gender violence, especially against women and children in our region,’’ said the EAC Deputy Secretary General in Charge of Productive and Social Sectors, Jean Claude Nsengivumwa. 

He added: ‘’Domestic violence is a deadly crime, a social menace, and a costly public health problem. Domestic violence can explode anywhere, anytime. We all have to make concerted efforts to avert the violence through increased awareness.’’

International sports icon Ambassador Dr Tegla Loroupe of Kenya, a former two-time world record holder in women’s marathon, will be special guest during the event.

Ambassador Loroupe is well known in the region as a firm activist against women and children violence. She has, among others, reformed a significant number of armed warring cattle rustlers in Northern Kenya, Southern Sudan, North-Eastern Uganda and Ethiopia and is famed for having brought considerable peace to these troubled- areas which has won her numerous regional and international awards.

Among the highlights of the activities is a workshop to sensitize EAC staff on how to mainstream gender in their programmes and activities on Monday(5^th March) at the Snow Crest Hotel.

The GIZ Support to the EAC Integration Process Programme Manager, Bernd Multhaup says:

The equality of women and men is an integral part of GIZ’s corporate culture’’, adding that GIZ has a long-standing tradition of gender mainstreaming, and its constantly updated gender strategy is based on the assumption that development would only be sustainable if women and men benefit equally from political, economic, social and cultural development, and if they fully exploit their potentials. 

Recent ‘EAC Gender Audit’ has acknowledged the EAC –GIZ Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) component as a best- practice for gender mainstreaming in EAC programmes.