The Vice President, Aja Dr Isatou Njie-Saidy, recently headed the Gambian delegation to the 6th African Development Forum, held in Addis Abba, Ethiopia.

The meeting brought together over thirty ministers from across Africa who deliberated on their governments’ stance in honoring the various protocols regarding the protection of the rights of women, gender equality, and women’s empowernment, as well as effort to ending violence against women in Africa.

In her address to over 400 delegates from around the world, the Gambian vice president emphasised that violence perpetrated by men and women, boys and girls against each other must never be condoned in the name of culture or tradition. She called on the men folk to recognise their women counterparts as partners and treat them with dignity, and to regarding them as people who have something to offer.

For the women, the vice president said: “empowerment is in our hands, nobody will empower us. We have to claim it and earn it. "On financing for gender, VP Njie-Saidy emphasised that if we do not invest in women, whom she said constitute more than half of our population, we would never achieve our development goals. She called on the Economic Commission for Africa, the African Union, the African Development Bank, the main initiators of the forum, as well as delegates, not to re-invent the wheel.

"Expectations are high and we cannot afford to fail those poor rural women and urban women. We must come up with actions within our implementation reach," she concluded.It could be recalled that the 6th African Development Forum ended recently in Addis Abba, Ethopia, with urgent calls by over thirty ministers from African governments to make good on the 2004 decision by the African Union to set up a special fund to fight violence against women. The provision is part of the protocol on the rights of Women which accompanies the African charter on Human and people’s rights, as well as the declaration on Gender Equality signed in Maputo, Mozambique, in 2004.

Donor partners, multi-lateral financial institutions, civil society organisations and the private sector attended the 6th forum held at the United Nations Conference Centre in Addis Abba, Ethiopia.