By: Shallon S. Gonlor
A call has been made for transformative course towards women’s empowerment programs and gender equality in Liberia that will scale up support to ensure better economic opportunities for women.
Amid persistent gender inequality and lack of women’s empowerment programs, the call was made by various speakers of women rights advocacy group during an intellectual symposium in Ganta City, Nimba County on Thursday, May 2, 2024.
At the gathering, mostly women spoke and advocated for concerted efforts to push for environmental justice and gender equality to enhance women’s status in Nimba County and other parts of Liberia.
During the symposium, women’s activists stressed an urgent need to chart a transformative course towards women’s empowerment and gender equality through skill programs which are essential for addressing gender inequality and dependency syndromes.
They further argued that it has become incumbent on leaders, especially in Liberia, to articulate a compelling vision of inclusive governance and gender parity, driven by structures that will give women more opportunities to occupy key decision and policy making positions.
Women rights’ activists, a notable advocate of women’s empowerment in Nimba, lamented that women play significant roles in agro-commodity production yet they are denied access to land based on obnoxious traditional and cultural practices that hinder them and reduce their potential.
They however called on Liberia President, Joseph N. Boakai’s government and the media to help strengthen the means to democratize development and make women’s voices heard within international solidarity agencies that promote and support women’s right and permit women more access to land ownership, stressing that “environmental justice cannot happen without gender justice”.
Activists said women are the backbone of societies’ growth and development because they are the primary producers yet get fewer benefits because of cultural practices that deny them ownership of land.
Decrying the situation where companies in the extractive industries are notorious in grabbing land from women in Nimba County without benefits, warning that this is leading to food insecurity, which is confronting cause of living, adding that food security suffers when women lose access to land, because it leads to economic disempowerment.
They at the same time highlighted the increasing level of violence against women in Nimba County, an act that has worked against women emancipation, referencing the recent gruesome attack on Mrs. Jessica David Wondah, a lady who hand was cut off by Daniel Nya Tokpah, a senior finance officer of the Nimba University for passing in his yard in Ganta City, Nimba County.
While called for reforms in all arms of government to give women more spaces with an action that will work towards ending the obnoxious ideas and cultural practices that exacerbate the crisis the women are grappling with.
In a submission, the intellectuals called on women to intensify their pivotal role in shaping the human trajectory, advocating for new generation of empowered women equipped with the knowledge, skills, through training and capacity building to effect positive change in their communities and beyond.
Meanwhile, women of Yekepa communities of ArcelorMittal-Liberia concession area are said to be victims of extractive industries evacuating them from their farmland with over little benefit, which the issues of policies in plantation areas are rarely talked about. The women pointed out that advocacy groups in their communities are pushing hard, especially on strengthening the laws that will protect women.
The women, mostly single mothers however noted that in most parts of Liberia especially in Nimba County, enhancing the status of women has faced massive impediments due to historical pattern of poor priorities and policies as well as cultural practices that have hindered the women and limited their potential.
It was agreed by them that, women play massive role in agro-commodity productivity as their efforts help to feed the growing population of the county. However, the women have limited access to land in most AML concession communities and in many others they face gender violence, unequal pay for jobs and suffer severe exclusion in decision and policy making bodies.
