ActionAid urges men to support women at home
Jirapa, UWR, June 23, GNA - Mr Tontie Binado, the Upper West Regional Programme Officer of ActionAid Ghana has urged men to support women in carrying out domestic chores.
This would help to empower them to contribute meaningfully to national development.
Mr Binado said the numerous domestic activities women engaged in did not have direct economic impact on their lives and the life of the family, rather those activities hindered their active participation in decision making processes such as politics both at the community and national levels.
'The numerous Unpaid Care Work women do at home such caring for the family, cooking, fetching water among others had nothing to benefit the women but to reduce their economic productivity as well as limit their time for social and national activities', he explained.
Mr Binado made the appeal at Tiza in the Jirapa District during a sensitisation tour of Tiza, Gbari and Wmankuri communities in the district to drum home the need for men to support women in their houses to help minimise Women Unpaid Care Work.
The tour which involved cooking competition among men in the communities formed part of effort by ActionAid to promote women empowerment and economic development as well as their rights under the Government of Netherlands' Ministry of Foreign Affairs funded Promoting Opportunity for Women Empowerment and Rights (POWER) Project.
Mr Tontie explained that in order to ensure a holistic empowerment and promotion of women's rights, there was the need to reduce the domestic activities which served as impediment to leveraging women's productivity and economic growth.
He said ensuring women's economic productivity does not only boost the economic capacity to ensure economic independence of the woman but also alleviated poverty in the family.
Naa James Bakuri, the Chief of the Gbari community noted that marriage was a voluntary union between a man and a woman and that there was the need for the two to co-habitate and support each other in all activities they engaged in.
He observed that household chores such as cooking, fetching water for the family, taking care of the children among others were not the duties of only the woman but both.
Naa Bakuri commended ActionAid Ghana for extending the initiative to the Gbari community and said it would help to promote mutual responsibility and relationship between men and their wives.
The participants acknowledged that the initiative by ActionAid to encourage men to help their wives at home in carrying domestic chores was a laudable idea since it would be in the benefit of the entire family to promote their marriage relationship.
GNA
By Philip Tengzu, GNA