Sunyani, March 30, GNA - Mad Hamida Harrison,

Convener for Women's Manifesto Coalition, a non-

governmental organization, has noted with regret that few

women in the country hold decision making positions and this

"makes the existing political structure undemocratic." She said this was in spite of the fact that the Constitution

and other laws recognized the principles of equality and the

right to non=96discrimination as central to the success of

democratic ideals. Madam Harrison was speaking on the topic, 93Using

affirmative action initiatives to enhance women's participation

in governance" at a one day forum in Sunyani. It was jointly organised by the Coalition and Abantu for

Development, also an NGO, with support from the European

Union. The sensitization forum, which was under the theme, 93More

seats for women in Elections 2012" was attended by 52 women

drawn from Sunyani Municipality and aimed at increasing

women's participation and representation in Election 2012. Mad Harrison said although Ghana was a signatory to

international conventions for the promotion of gender equality

as a right and acknowledged women's participation as critical

in building democracy, not much had been done to implement

those conventions. She said many countries had attained the 30 per cent

threshold recommended by the Beijing for Action through the

use of affirmative action and called on the government to use

affirmative action policy in Election 2012 to promote women's

participation and representation in decision making. "It is high time women represent their own interests as they

have long been represented by men who know least about their

interests," she said. Mad Harrison said the representation of women in the

legislative setting was not encouraging, with only 19 women out

of the 230 representatives of the people in Parliament for the

population of 24 million, with women in the majority of about

52 per cent.

Madam Harrison appealed to the legislature to formulate

laws that would increase women's participation in decision

making and called on political parties to also raise the number

of women candidates who participate in elections. "Affirmative action must be introduced to make women

provide inputs in governance", she said. Mr. Michael Amponsah, Deputy Brong=96Ahafo Regional

Director of the National Commission for Civic Education, said

it was social justice to promote women at all levels of decision

making because they were in the majority. "At all levels 50 per cent of women should be present but

the state has only 18 per cent of women in Parliament", he

noted. Mr Amponsah said in terms of resource allocation 80 per

cent was allocated to men 93because women are under-

represented in the decision making process" and called for

women to be fully integrated into mainstream governance for

economic development. He urged women to take interest in programmes that would

empower, enhance, and promote their growth in the political,

economic and social sectors and urged those in government to

empower women through training and other educational

activities. Mr Amponsah called on municipal and district assemblies

to train women in advocacy, lobbying and public speaking to

equip them to take leadership roles since they had long been

marginalized.