M Tshabalala-Msimang: Meeting of the National Gender Machinery

16 February 2009

The Programme Director;
Honourable Ministers
Deputy Ministers
Honourable Members of Parliament
The Commission for Gender Equality (CGE)
Directors-General
Distinguished Participants
The media
Ladies and gentlemen

Good morning and a very warm welcome to this meeting in preparation towards
our participation at the upcoming 53rd Session of the United Nations Commission
on the Status of Women (UN CSW), scheduled for 2 to 13 March 2009.

I wish to extend my special thanks and gratitude to all of you for
responding positively to what was a very short notice of meeting. At the very
outset allow me to begin by thanking the Deputy Minister for Social Development
and the Department itself, in particular the Gender Unit, for so graciously
responding to our humble and urgent request for them to host this meeting.
Their assistance, both financially and in facilitation has made possible our
gathering today. I wish to also thank Ms Imelda Diouf for her free secretariat
services rendered today. We thank you all very much indeed. I believe this kind
of close collaboration is what is needed to strengthen the National Gender
Machinery and to allow all of us to own processes. Our successes can only then
be enjoyed collectively.

Madam Programme Director
I am sure that this meeting will recall that I iterated in the previous NGM
meeting that it was going to be the last one for the current administration.
Clearly I was too hasty in doing so, given the highly pressured and tight
timeframes for delivery on some urgent objectives. We had no choice therefore
but to call you back to a meeting.

At this point, Madam Programme Director, I want this NGM meeting to applaud
itself, given the issues raised in the President’s State of the Nation Address
delivered on 06 February 2009. Our ardent efforts and perseverance in ensuring
that women’s issues were included into the Address has paid off. This was in
fact a highly mainstreamed Address – you will have noted that women’s concerns
and issues were raised throughout the speech. However, of note is the special
mention of the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development as well as the issue of
the 50/50 representation of women in decision-making positions. His Excellency,
The President, also mentioned the review of the institutional mechanisms for
promoting women’s empowerment and gender equality. But this was not to be so
with the national budget 2009 being that was silent on the financing for
women’s empowerment and gender equality.

Colleagues,
The previous NGM decided on the following:
• The establishment of a task team to take forward the development of the
policy paper on strengthening the institutional mechanisms through establishing
a women’s ministry
• The establishment of a Task Team to prepare for our National Campaign on the
50/50 representation of women in political and decision-making positions;
and
• A meeting to especially to address the substantive discussions for and
preparation of the national delegation to the 53rd session of the UN CSW.

I am happy to report that progress has been made in all three areas thus
far:
• I have, since the last meeting, established both the Task Teams.
• The Task Team on the Policy Paper for strengthening Institutional Mechanisms
have to date met on four occasions to work on the draft paper, which I am happy
to announce is before you today and will be discussed later in the programme.
Allow me to take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude and thanks to
the Task Team Members, led by Adv Thuli Madonsela, for their tireless efforts
in this regard.
• The Task Team on the 50/50 National Campaign were requested to produce key
messages from the different sectors across society and have been able to hold
one meeting to date towards developing a project plan for this campaign.
• I have also written to Madam Storey Morutoa, Chairperson of the Joint
Monitoring Committee on the Improvement of the Quality of Life and Status of
Women in National Parliament requesting the Committee to host a multi-party
media briefing on the national campaign. This will take place within the week
in Cape Town. I must extend our most sincere gratitude to her and the
Committee.
• In addition, I have developed a media statement from The Ministry on
Valentine’s Day and the significance of us taking note of the equal sharing of
responsibilities between men and women in developing loving and harmonious
relationships, particularly in terms of increasing men’s roles in nurturing and
caring for children. I have highlighted the desirability of formally allowing
them to be present during labour and delivery to also enhance bonding with
their babies. The key issue I highlighted is the need for us to review our
policies/legislation on maternal and paternal leave to allow men in particular
to be trained about caring for their babies and children.
• I have also written to the Chief Whip in National Parliament to allow me an
opportunity to address the National Assembly on the upcoming CSW. But more
importantly I wish to use this opportunity to bring in the 50/50 national
campaign, the review of the institutional mechanisms, and the exclusion of any
mention of a dedicated budget for women’s empowerment in the Budget Vote
Address last week.

Madam Programme Director and Colleagues,
The meeting we are attending today is particularly focusing on our preparations
towards the 53rd Session of the UN CSW. My address therefore is really divided
in two parts – in this part I intend to raise some thought-provoking points to
set the tone for discussions that follow. My address at the close of this
meeting will be more targeted at our national media – what is it that we should
be saying to the rest of society and what do we want a national discourse
around!

Distinguished delegates, we must ensure that today’s dialogue allows us to
identify experiences we can share with the international world, and what
lessons we can offer to the rest of the world as good practices from our
country. This must form the cornerstone for our inputs and interjections in the
discussions of the high-level round tables and interactive dialogues on the
three thematic areas identified for the 53rd Session.

We need to identify those questions that we should, as South Africa, pose to
the experts in the different panels – questions which will stimulate discussion
at the global level and get the whole world thinking and talking – this is what
I envisage as South Africa’s role in the 53rd Session.

In terms of global policy and legal frameworks, Member States have committed
on various platforms on the equal sharing of responsibilities between men and
women including care giving in the context of HIV and AIDS. How have we
translated these into our national policies and legal framework? What pieces of
legislation guarantees this principle? In this regard, what is our status with
regard to the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention No 156 of 1981
on Workers and Family Responsibilities – have we signed? If not, what are we
going to do to address and fast track this process in 2009? How do we turn this
policy into action for the society to actually begin to transform gender and
power relations to effect the principle of shared responsibilities and shared
work?

Delegates, what are we saying about our national policies towards ensuring
full participation and partnership of both women and men in productive and
reproductive life, including shared responsibility for the care and nurturing
of children and maintenance of the household? Do we need to review our
legislation on maternal and paternal leave / rights and how do we ensure that
we increase male responsibility with respect to child-rearing and housework –
do we need to incentivise in order to encourage this and if so – what are
they?

What investments should be made in appropriate measures to lesson the daily
burden of domestic responsibilities, the greatest share of which falls on women
and to truly recognize the unpaid work by women?

What do we say about flexi-time and flexi-hours of work, parental leave,
family responsibility leave, day-care facilities at work places, maternal
leave, breast-feeding policies, and health insurance?

Should we look at the possibility of conducting gender analyses of our
policies in this regard to determine to what extent they respond to the needs
of both women and men in encouraging shared responsibilities, and identify what
we therefore need to change.

Ladies and gentlemen, how do we translate similar rights to those working in
the informal and non-formal sector – where we find predominantly women and poor
people confined?

How do we address the issue of the gendered division of labour and household
responsibilities within our society?

How do we raise awareness of, and challenge those gender stereotypes that
perpetuate perceptions of women as natural care-givers and men as the main
bread-winners, including through interventions in the education system, the
media and through awareness-raising campaigns?

Programme Director,
I can go on and on posing such questions. I will stop at this point and let the
discussions and debates tackle these issues in depth. However, it would be
absolutely remiss of me if I do not raise this last question to this
meeting:
WHAT MONITORING TOOLS AND MECHANISMS SHOULD WE USE / PUT IN PLACE TO MONITOR
OUR PROGRESS IN THIS REGARD?

Delegates, allow me this opportunity as well to inform this meeting that I
had been really generous and extremely fair in forming this year’s national
delegation to the CSW. I have extended an invitation to all nine provinces, a
number of related national departments, the CGE, the Monitoring Committee in
Parliament, and several NGOs to form our national team going to New York. This
is a large delegation and we must therefore prepare ourselves most carefully to
ensure we do not end up becoming in-cohesive while in New York. I will expect
and actually demand that all delegates fulfil the specific roles assigned to
them on time.

I wish you fruitful and enjoyable discussions and debates and wish to
encourage you towards the development of a sound outcome document from this
meeting as South Africa’s position on the thematic areas.

Thank you and Aleuta Continuum.
 
Issued by: The Presidency
16 February 2009