Pages
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
Topic Discussion III
Participation in
Democratic Decision-Making:
The Vital Voices of Women, Civil Society and
Pluralism
Room 4
(2 of 20 pages)
Chair: My name is Heba El Shazli (ph). I have an Egyptian name and I am
an Egyptian American, so you can see I have both Egypt and the USA. I am the Regional Representative for the American
Trade Union Movement in North Africa and the Middle East. I am based in Cairo, but my headquarters are in Washington,
DC, in the United States. It is a pleasure and an honor for me to be here with you. I have a few things I'd like
to go over before we begin.These are just a few rules. In any democratic system there are some rules that will
help us successfully deal with the issues at hand.
First, we have three designated speakers, so we are quite honored, who will give us a presentation of about ten
minutes each so they can set the stage and give us the basic framework for the discussion. We will do our very
best, and I am determined, that we will focus on very concrete and practical applications. We're going to talk
about solutions, about case studies and success stories. We all know what the problems are. I don't want to hear
problems. We all know them very well; we live them, we breathe them, we eat them, so I want to hear more success
stories so that when we leave this room we have some examples of successes. I hope you agree with me. What we call
our best practices. I would also very much like to ask you to dispense with formalities. We have already thanked
the Yemeni government, the hosts, and everyone many, many times, so please let us dispense with formalities. We
are all brothers and sisters here. In order for all of us to participate I will ask you to please limit your remarks.
Depending on how many people want to talk, we will see, but my inclination will be three to five minutes and I
apologize in advance but we're going to talk about very concrete things and I can see that we can do it in three
to five minutes, because I want to hear from everyone. Are there any questions at this time, or any comments or
disagreements. Ready? Okay.
Let me introduce to you, with great honor, our first speaker, Madame Grace Coleman from Ghana. Mrs. Coleman in
1996 won parliamentary elections and became the Member of Parliament. She is a member of the Finance Committee,
Vice Chairman of the Women's Caucus and the Vice Chairman of the Population Caucus. She is currently the Coordinator
of the Netherlands Interest Group in parliament, and she has since 1997 served on delegations to Cuba and the United
States. I am giving you a very short biography of Mrs. Coleman, and please excuse us. She has a number of accomplishments,
so without any further ado, please, Mrs. Coleman.
Hon. Grace Coleman: Thank you very much, Madame Coordinator. I am, according to your instructions, dispensing
with my written script and am trying just to go by points and I hope you don't mind, because I can't make the time
with my script.
First of all, I think it is commonly held that the legitimacy of government is derived from the people. The government,
if it is accountable to the democratic control and if it is bound by the rule of law and universally accepted standards
of human rights, that that country can act on behalf of the people. Now, this legitimacy gives the right to the
government and it is this legitimacy which makes the government strong. I want to start by saying that when we
are talking about people, we are talking about a government which derives its rights from the people, then the
people must be seen to mean all people, and all people includes women. I know that in the world today it is not
contentious to say that we have been neglected for a very, very long time and in my own country I am sure my government
knows very well how the people of Ghana, especially the women of Ghana, feel about the way women have been treated
over the years. As a matter of fact, we at the moment constitute only 9%, I mean as women MPs, have only 19 members
out of the 200 members of parliament. We think this is inadequate and something has to be done about it, and that
something is what I think my Coordinator wants me to talk about.
|
[ Introduction ] [ Worldwide Activities ] [ What We Do ] |