By Lizwe Chitanganya
Women leaders require support from all stakeholders in order to fulfill their mandate and meaningfully participate in development issues. The protection of women helps in their contributions to national decision making, giving the assurance to implement as per their designations.
On the 21st anniversary of the adoption of the Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security by the United Nations Security Council, 31 October 2021, the She Leads project conducted a discussion to reflect on Zimbabwe’s implementation of the resolution. This project and discussion was supported by the Embassy of Ireland in Pretoria, South Africa.
What came out of the discussion showed there was important need to look back on the thoughts, actions and transformations required in order to not only protect women, but also provide concrete pillars for their involvement in leadership.
The key points to takeaway from the reflection were:
Decision Making
Women leaders should be placed at forefront for decision making on issues regarding peace. The involvement of women at the point of decision crafting and implementation will increase the development of more solutions that assure and reinforce the security of women.
Collective Planning
For any action plans that are being developed, it is important to have collective participation. This entails the inclusion of all parties, women and men, can result in inequalities being addressed as plans will be developed with all relevant voices getting space.
Empower security forces
There is need to have security forces that understand issues around women’s issues. This could be through hiring of specialist women in the security forces or training more of the men and women that are already in the establishments. It is important to be able to make it easier for women to report issues where their peace and security has been violated.
A replay of the discussion may be found here:
She Leads focuses on promoting the full and effective participation and leadership of women and girls in political and societal decision-making in Zimbabwe.
