Colleges laud Government’s women empowerment programmes
TERTIARY institutions have hailed Government initiatives to empower women and young girls with skills and various capacity-building programmes that enable them to participate fully in economic activities.
Working closely with different developmental organisations, the Government continues to channel resources towards capacitating females with skills and knowledge for unlocking business potential and facilitating societal progress.
This comes as the Second Republic is actively engaged in implementing comprehensive policies and initiatives aimed at scaling up the participation and meaningful contribution of women to mainstream economy.
These multifaceted strategies cover various sectors and dimensions of society, ranging from economic empowerment programmes to educational initiatives and legal reforms. In an interview during the recent launch of the Women in Technical Education and Development (Wited) Chapter at the Bulawayo Polytechnic, Mutare Polytechnic Applied Sciences Department lecturer, Ms Victoria Sampindi, said a lot of strategic initiatives have been done to empower women but said many beneficiaries were not embracing the opportunities.
“Government has been doing a lot of strategic plans and policies have been put in place to empower women and the girl child. For example, in tertiary institutions, they put in programmes to allow more enrolment of the girl child,” said Ms Sampindi.
“We talk of the small and medium enterprises (SMEs), women organisations and the Government has done a lot. It has been supporting women so much, but now, we need to change the mindset of the women, how many of them are willing to take that path.
“The rate at which things are happening is a bit slow in as much as the Government would want to take us all on board. Women are reluctant, that is why we are saying, we are coming in as Wited to encourage them to be bold enough to stand up and take all those opportunities.
The Association of Technical Universities and Polytechnics (Atupa) initiated the Wited project to identify the needs and successes of women’s participation in technical education, training and employment.
Speaking at the same event, Harare Polytechnic vice principal, Mrs Deborah Ruziwa, also applauded the Government saying polytechnics and teachers’ colleges were embracing gender equality with the institutions recording an increase in the number of women who are taking leadership positions.-chroncile
