ECOWAS calls for lawmakers involvement in economic, social programmes

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The ECOWAS Parliament Committee on Gender, Women, Empowerment, Social Protection, Human Rights and Vulnerable Groups, has urged parliamentarians to be more involved in economic and social policy programmes of their countries.

This is part of a report on the “Implementation of Instruments and International Agreements’’ adopted in the area of gender at the parliament’s just concluded five-day 4th Legislature de-localised meeting in Niamey.

The resolution was signed by Kaboubie Bertile and Fatimata Niambiaki, who both chaired the committee.

The committee tasked parliamentarians in the sub-region to take necessary steps to ratify international, continental and regional instruments and ensure the domestication of same in the interest of their citizens.

It also urged parliamentarians to domesticate and implement the supplementary action on equity between women and men and to promote the institutionalisation of the gender approach at both the national and regional level.

It said parliamentarians should particularly take the gender perspective into account during the adoption of budgets and ensure that gender was incorporated into all policies, strategies and development programmes in their countries.

The committee further tasked parliamentarians to make legislative proposals or vote bills that were intended to align the national legislative framework on the provisions of convention.

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It also charged the legislature to embark on sensitisation campaign, education and information workshop for the benefit of people in rural areas where domestic violence, genital mutilation and rape was common.

The de-localised meeting with the theme: “Harmonisation of Gender Policies within the ECOWAS Region”, focused on the statues of the application of ECOWAS text in terms of men and women equality.

It also discussed the promotion of gender, women’s rights and the need to domesticate international conventions and treaties among member countries.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that since the July 23, 1993 revised treaty, gender issues had been a major concern to the ECOWAS.

Through the provision of Article 63 of the treaty on women development, member states undertook to formulate, harmonise, coordinate and establish appropriate policies and mechanisms to enhance women´s economic and cultural conditions.

The ECOWAS Parliament is made up of 15-member countries which include Nigeria, Niger, Togo, The Gambia and Benin.

Others are Guinea Bissau, Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Senegal and Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Cote d´Ivoire and Ghana.

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