Women Challenged to Take Leadership Roles

Akropong — The Clerk of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana (PCG), Rev. Dr. Samuel Ayete-Nyampong, has called on women in Africa, with specific reference to Ghana, to challenge themselves to take up leadership positions in the running of the country.

According to the PCG boss, characteristic of many rural communities, most women in Africa, which Ghana was no exception, considered themselves as second class to men.

This, he noted, had de-motivated them to take frontline positions in developing and managing resources.

He explained that God created men and women in His image, and therefore, gave equal abilities and gifts to them, as well as equal access to natural resources for their survival.

Rev. Dr. Ayete-Nyampong declared that religious women had a divine responsibility to free themselves from the domineering actions of men and social systems that enslave them and inhibit their productivity and resourcefulness.

He made the call on Tuesday at Akropong during the opening session of this year's Faith to Action Women's Conference (FAWC), which was under the theme: "Empowering Women in Religion for Effective Use of God-Given Resources."

Rev. Dr. Ayete-Nyampong averred that the theme was significant, because, among other things, it recognised the role of women in ensuring the effective use of God's resources in a world which is male-dominated, and where women were disadvantaged in the use of resources for the betterment of their lives in society.

He explained that in Ghana, women and men occupied distinct positions in the economy, largely as a result of gender division of labor within households and society at large, especially, in the rural areas, although women form about 51.5 percent of the population.

"Some unpaid labour involves repetitive and time-consuming tasks, such as collection of firewood, water fetching, childcare, sweeping, garbage disposal and cooking, as well as the reproduction of social relations in the household and community. Ghanaian women spend twice as much time on domestic work than men," he stated.

The Clerk of the General Assembly of PCG argued that religion should encourage the enrollment of children of all sexes in schools, and rise against any that discouraged girl-child education.

According to him, the Ghana Living Survey of 2000 indicated that 44.1 percent of women, as opposed 21.1 percent of men, had no formal education.

Despite that most girls than boys drop out of school at all levels of the educational ladder, while issues of poverty, early marriage and teenage pregnancy had also affected women's ability to study to higher levels.

He further advised that religious women should be empowered to maintain a clean and green environment, and called on those who fetch water from rivers and streams to lead the campaign against water pollution by surface mining.
BY ISAAC AKWETEY-OKUNOR