President: All benefit when women gain

CALLING for improvements in the lives of women, President Paula-Mae Weekes said everyone benefits when women do well, in her message for International Women’s Day.

“When women are healthy, educated and working on a full and equal basis with their male counterparts, their families, communities and societies thrive. It is, therefore, in the interest of every man, woman and child to ensure that women have both the opportunity and the necessary tools to fulfil their highest potential.”

She said gender equality can only be achieved with the engagement of men and boys, especially given’s the Caribbean history of matrifocality and male marginalisation.

“Women have spearheaded the gender equality movement for years, but discrimination against them will never end until men and boys recognise their role in perpetuating gender inequality.”

She noted “significant progress” in the past 25 years since the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action of 1995, an ambitious roadmap to achieving gender equality.

“It might even appear that the metaphorical glass ceiling has been shattered. At the global level, maternal mortality rates are plummeting and more and more women are being educated and rising to prominent positions in national parliaments and in the boardroom.”

Yet a closer look shows women still suffer significant discrimination and violence in their personal and professional lives, Weekes said.

“According to the United Nations, women still earn 23 per cent less than men and perform the lion’s share of unpaid care and domestic work. One in five women and girls have experienced physical and/or sexual violence by an intimate partner, yet 49 countries lack laws which protect women from domestic violence.”

Weekes said that in the Caribbean, 94 per cent of girls get an education and women increasingly enter women in the workforce, yet women are still earn less than men.

While some territories meet the critical mass benchmark of 30 per cent females in parliament, this is well below the 50 per cent that reflects the composition of society.

“Change has come about at a slow pace and, in some critical regards, seems to have stalled altogether.” Weekes lamented gender-based violence in the Caribbean.

“Three of the top ten recorded rape rates in the world occur in this region and in a survey of nine Caribbean countries it was found that 48 per cent of adolescent girls had a sexual initiation that can be described as forced.

“Unfortunately, a culture of shame and silence, victim-blaming, sensational media reporting and a lack of sympathy or action by police and other first responders ensure that many victims remain silent and the scourge of gender-based violence continues.” Weekes said institutions, laws and policies must become robust, to meet the needs of women and girls.