Happy International Women’s Day!!

 

Last week I held two make up classes for the International Women’s Day lesson. Early Friday morning I met up with Walters (the YAN in country ‘go to’ guy) who helped me take photos and hold prizes at the GHS Buea Town general assembly.

 

For the essay contest we had three students tied for 2nd place: Ekah Judith, Malange Clinton and Kfu Patience (pictured above) and one 1st place, Yatuh Ketline (pictured below). Prizes comprised of a variety of school supplies like notebooks, pens, pencils, etc were given at the assembly.


See what Ketline has to say below…

 GHS Buea Town Winning IWD Essay:

 

Chosen Essay Questions:

1. Why is it important for a woman to be empowered and able to make her own decisions

2. What are some other ways men, women, girls and boys around the world can advocate for women and other causes?

3. How does the material we covered today in class relate to the work YAN does?

 

To empower means to make someone feel that he/she has control over their life and their work. Empowerment is to formally give a person or an organization the legal authority to do something. Empowering women means empowering her family and in turn her community which translates a powerful force that can change the world in significant positive ways. Also, letting a woman to make decisions brings more equality to mankind. It balances the strengths and weaknesses of men and women to compliment each other. If the world were run by men and women in unity, how awesome e it would be.

            It is important for a woman to be empowered politically, this is holding or occupying positions in government. When she is there, she will make women benefit form it. She will do everything in her power to see that women are taken care of, they are provided with their essential needs. If this happens, there is going to be peace and harmony in the world.

            It is also important to empower a woman economically. This is done through loans given to them or opening up business centers. When a woman is economically stable, she makes decisions for herself and the family. She will be able to take care of her children and provide for her family in the times of need or when the man is financially unstable. This will reduce the rate of depression, poverty and hardship in out contemporary society.

            It is also very important when a woman is empowered morally. When she is no being beaten, neglected, or forced into early marriages, but instead, sent to school in full term, hher self esteem will no be damaged and she is going to manage her home in an advanced way. She will be able to bring up her children in an upright manner making them to be good and better citizens

 

There are ways in which men, women, boys and girls can advocate for women. Firstly, the opening of ministries like the Ministry of Women’s’ Empowerment and the Family headed by Marie-Therese Abena Oncloua. This ministry see in it that, the problems and struggles of women are taken into consideration and finding lasting solutions. This helps to make the women known  and advocacy can be carried out through this media.

            Another way is by proclaiming days like International Women’s Day which is set out to celebrate the economic, political and social achievements of women. This is another way of advocate because awareness is created on the relevance and importance of a women in out society.

            Lastly, setting up radio campaigns is another way. On the radio, we can sensitize woman and children on the importance of mainlining women's rights leading to gender equality and unity.

 

The material we covered in class related to the work we do in YAN. The primary aim of YA is creating awareness to the public on problems affecting our communities and the country at large. In YAN, we identify a problem that’s affecting our society. In the movies, we identified problems. We discovered that in all the movies, the prominent problem is that women are violate, suppressed and no counted.

            In YAN, after identifying the problem, we find out what the world has to chare with us concerning that problem (researching our specific topic). In the movies we watched, the problem has been identified and women form Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Uganda, Sierra Leone and Ghana shared their thoughts and experiences on the problem.

In YAN, after knowing what the world's opinions are about your problem identified, you then advocate. Sensitize the people on the possible preventions, ways to reduce or completely eradicate the problem. In the movies, we saw how individuals and organizations have come up to put an end or reduce the rate in which women are violated and minimized.

 

To conclude, from the assessment above, we can say that it is very important to empower a woman in economic, political and social domains. This is going to promote gender equality, harmony and unity in out contemporary society.

“Women rise up and make the men to count you”

-Yatuh Ketline


Stay tuned for the winners of the Advanced YAN class and the regular club at Lycee Molyko! All of our club students move into podcasting and out Advanced class begins preparations to film,