Lesotho Celebrates August as African Women's Month

Lesotho will celebrate the African Women's Day, August, by a ceremony promoting women in politics and decision-making positions, awarding them certificates of honour.

A statement from the Ministry of Gender, Youth, Sports and Recreation said the African Union had chosen the month so that member countries "intensify their gender community and urban-based socio-political and economic empowerment activities."

People who will receive the honours, at a ceremony at the Maseru Sun on August 4, will include government ministers; principal secretaries and other prominent women in society, the statement said.

Meanwhile the Lesotho News Agency (LENA) reports that Lesotho and South African women are to celebrate international Women's Day together at the historical Mantsopa Caves in LadyBrand, South Africa, on August 9. The African National Congress (ANC) Women's League invited their Lesotho Congress for democracy (LCD) counterparts to this joint celebration.  

Orange Free State provincial chair of the ANC Women's League, Ms Zinzi Ntombela, told LENA that this was their way of expressing appreciation for the valuable contribution Basotho women had played in the ANC's struggle for liberty.

Their appreciation of the role played by Lesotho women in ensuring the welfare of South African refugees who sought asylum in the country during the apartheid era by sharing with the LCD women, would include sharing with the local women progress made by the ANC in empowerment of women. The idea of sharing issues of empowerment aims at assisting the LCD women achieve their own empowerment in turn, Ms Ntombela said.

South Africa marks Women's Day annually on August 9 in South Africa, although ANC Women's League marks it in its own way, honouring the organisation's female heroes, especially those who died in the battle for freedom.

30 July 2004