Hajia Alima and the students of Zouzugu JHS and Islamic SHS during a break session spend a few minutes sharing dreams and ideas of leadership especially among young women and how men/boys can be supportive and open to this new norm.
What was clear at the end of the discussion was that there is really a lot that we have to do as development workers, leaders, and individuals to work on the mentality held about women in leadership. There is the need to ensure that the spaces are ready to fully embrace a woman in leadership and to work to enhance the leadership capacity of our young girls such that they will be points of reference of great works years later.
Abdul Samed Khadija
A Panel Discussion was held inside @sanatuzambang which centered on how our community can build the spirit of Leadership in young girls, particularly at the JHS and SHS level. This is part of a series of activities the studios together with Swida Ghana have lined up in anticipation of International Women Day 2021. #IWD2021#IWD
On the panel, was the Media & Communication Officer for @norsaac2019 as well as two female leaders from JHS and SHS, thus Mavis, the Senior Prefect Zouzugu JHS, and Shakira, Girl Prefect for Islamic SHS, Tamale.
I was amazed at how much had come out of the discussion. For instance, Mavis, the SP of her JHS, and Shakira, GSP for her SHS talked about the challenges they encountered on their path to leadership; mockery from colleagues particularly males, religious beliefs about women’s leadership, and even negative comments from teachers. That particular one stabbed me. Shakira spoke about how whilst in class a teacher mentioned that women who become leaders end up with no husband’s and sleep from man to man because of their arrogance. She said she was sooo angry by the comment her hands began to shake and she couldn’t even continue writing
Abdul Samed Khadija
Hajia Alima Sagito-Saeed is the Executive Director of Savannah Integrated Rural Development Aid, an organization that helps districts mobilize communities, provide social services, and train women and youth.
Hajia Alima is a Development Management Consultant with an MSC in Managing Rural Development from the University of London and B/A Integrated Development Studies from the University for Development Studies. She has a number of certificates from recognized institution related to her profession and career development.
She recently attended a certificate course in Canada at St. Francis Xavier University and awarded a certificate in Advocacy and Increasing Citizens Voice and Agency in 2018.
Swida-GH partner with UDS WOCOM to hold a female empowerment summit.
The summit is one of the series of activities that Swida-Gh hopes to carry out in partnership with UDS-WOCOM under the Women-lead: Women’s voice and leadership programme. After this summit the next on the agender is the mentorship academy that is open to all female students in the school.
The “Women Empowerment for Leadership and Action for Development (Women-LEAD),” is expected to promote gender equality at all levels in the Northern region and it will be implemented in both Tamale Metro and Sagnarigu district.
The components for the Women-Lead project include economic empowerment of women, mobilization, sensitization, and campaign to end gender-based and all forms of violence against women.
Also, the project seeks to work with policymakers and implementers to influence the implementation of gender-sensitive policies through engagements with duty bearers and stakeholders responsible for women’s issues while at the same time work to increase women’s leadership in all corridors of power.
The three-year project is being funded by Global Affairs Canada and Plan International Ghana, under the auspices of Plan International’s “Women’s Voice and Leadership” project in Ghana. Continue Reading…….