Accra, Aug. 21, GNA - A workshop for women in politics have established a Coalition of Women in Politics (COWIP) to facilitate high level female participation in decision-making across the political divide.

The Coalition is to provide a platform to ensure that women's voices are heard beyond current levels. The Coalition was formed at the end of a two-day follow up workshop organised by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) under the theme: Towards Strengthening and Transforming Governance in Ghana: Empowering Women to Lead.

The COWIP is to steer the implementation of the Women's Manual to develop a bottom-up approach to realising the workshop's theme in the impending District Assembly elections and to ensure maximum women's participation in the elections.

A Communiqu=E9 issued at the end of the workshop agreed that Political Parties should be encouraged to reduce Filing Fees for women candidates in their Presidential, Parliamentary and Political Party Primaries.

It was agreed that Political Parties should be encouraged to adopt policies that would facilitate direct increase in the number of women at the Parliamentary level such as selecting women candidates in places which the Parties could demonstrably refer to as their strongholds. Since women represent more than 50 per cent of the country's population, Government should mainstream gender issues in policies, programmes and project designs.

COWIP was charged to forward the Women's Manual to Government, Political Parties, Gender Advocacy groups, Civil Society Organisations and the general public for awareness- creation , advocacy and subsequent adoption by the State and Political Parties. Participants commended the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) in strengthening women's efforts and enhancing their involvement in decision-making processes of the country.

The Women's Manual seeks to promote participation of women in governance; promote equal representation of women in political party decision-making and mainstreaming of gender in Political Party policy-making and support political parties in developing strategies and activities to promote and work towards gender equity.