By Audrey John
Stop-it Sierra Leone base on the International Women’s Day celebration launches # She Stands 2023, with the theme Break The Bias in Under Representation of Women in Politics the press conference took place at Stop it SL head office in Freetown on the 7th March 2023.
#She Stands 2023 is implemented by stop it Sierra Leone, a locally registered Organization working with other partners in Sierra Leone on democratic governance issues to promote gender representation in sierra Leone.
She stands help women to be appreciated and incorporated into the body polity of Sierra Leone as key partners in diversity, participation and inclusion. Through a series of activities, various publics can identify and assess women candidates that are capable of convincing voters and vote them office to represent their interests .the publics will have full access to the profiles of these women candidates about their backgrounds.
The Executive Director, John Koroma said he believe in women empowerment, women should be at the front line women should not be afraid of male dominance in society, as the organization operates in three thematic areas which is Education Health and Human Development.
He stated that in Education they partner with Schools and Communities in providing Educational programmes about human rights that inspire Change in behavior, Morals, and responsibility in the Management of rights and the prevention of abuse against women, Children and the Youth. And in Health they are partner with the Government of Sierra Leone and line ministries, departments and agencies of government in addressing Autism Spectrum disorder a special ailment caused by a neuron-brain damage condition in children at childbirth, often resulting to difficulty in speech control, mannerisms defunct physical and mental feature and other attendant social upheavals like child pregnancy he said and also in human development they envisage in the nearest future that the challenges facing there’s members, especially Women and Youth in addressing human rights would have to be aided with development programmes as they will need everyone support to advance Human rights and stop the abuses he stated.
John Koroma said the objectives of #She Stands is to improve under representation of women on local, parliamentary and National levels of governance help female candidates to achieve their aims and objectives of becoming councilors, members of Parliament or the president of Sierra Leone encourage and work with political parties to know what they have to offer to women on quota seats enabling women candidates to find financial opportunities and support through crowd funding programmes, and other fundraising events to support their campaigns and also to match women’s gender equity status to men for political power grid to narrow the gap between men and women for accessing political representation to ensure more legislative and political reforms guarantee women safe political zones he stated.