Sub Saharan Africa

Women in the civil rights group "Let's Save Togo" said they will have a week long sex strike to demand the resignation of President Faure Gnassingbe.

The plan for women to withhold sex from their husbands for a week will start Monday, said Isabelle Ameganvi , leader of the group's women's wing. She said the strike will urge Togo's men to take action against Gnassingbe.

Ameganvi, a lawyer, told the Associated Press that her group is following the example of Liberia's women who used a sex strike in 2003 to campaign for peace.

Kenyan’s new constitution is not only a historic landmark for Kenya, but a milestone in the East African women’s rights movement.

It has opened the widest space for women’s participation in public decision making, more so through Article 27, Kenya has joined its sister countries of East Africa in the use of constitutional quotas to advance women’s political participation.

Somalia has recently selected its parliament on Somali soil for the first time since the civil war of the late 1980s. This is a significant achievement since regional power brokers such as Ethiopia and Kenya, with the financial and logistical backing of the European Union, the United States and the United Nations, concocted Somali governments in neighbouring countries. 

THE Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has agreed to reduce by half, the Sh500,000 it was demanding as nomination fee for any of the women hoping to join the country representative race.

TheSh500,000 amount is among the proposals which the IEBC has made in its proposed elections guidelines and rules. The proposal, exclusively reported by the Star,elicited widespread condemnation from a cross section of leaders in civil society, religious as well as political groups.

Two women are running for president: Amal Abdi Ibrahim and Asha Ahmed Abdalla.

In announcing her candidature, Asha Ahmed Abdalla, a member of parliament, accused the current government of favouring corruption and intimidation in the parliament.

This is the second time she runs in the presidential race: in 2004 she was defeated by former president Abdullahi Yusuf. While Amal Abdi Ibrahim, 37, who has been living for 20 years in Finland, announced that if elected she would fight for widows of war and single mothers.

Women representation in parliaments in Africa is unlikely to increase as per the international requirements, former Ugandan minister for ethics and integrity Miria Matembe said on Wednesday.

Addressing a regional dialogue on women political leadership in Nairobi, Matembe said most governments are busy opening space for women but ends up ensuring that women of their choice that helps them maintain status quo are elected.

Women who constitute 52 percent of Zimbabwe's population (the impending census could establish that figure might have increased), have been conspicuously quiet on this matter despite having actively participated in the constitutional outreach process including the chaotic first all-stakeholder's conference.

The women's movement led by the Women's Coalition has had numerous consultative meetings to ensure that women's views are well captured in the draft.