Tongo (U/E), Dec. 14, GNA – Ms Dorcas Zoogah, the Upper East Regional Chairperson of the Young Urban Women’s Movement (YUWM), has called on women rights advocates and social justice organisations to engage the media to change attitudes towards Gender-Based Violence (GBV).

She said women rights advocates and social justice organisations could influence and direct media content, including television (TV) and radio advertisements, to promote the gender agenda.

“They should use the media to change attitudes towards GBV by mainstreaming gender issues in public discourses and project the story of the empowered woman in the media space,” she said.

Ms Zoogah said this in a signed communique issued by the Regional Chapter of the YUWM, an affiliate of ActionAid Ghana, and presented to the Talensi District Assembly at Tongo to commemorate this year’s 16 Days of Activism Against GBV at workplaces in the district.

Members of the group, numbering over 1500 from 30 communities across eight Districts in the Region, were sponsored by the Hewlett Foundation in partnership with ActionAid Ghana.

The Chairperson indicated that the focus area of the YUWM was on human rights, which cut across unpaid work, economic security and body integrity of women.

Giving an overview of issues of GBV, Ms Zoogah said harassment in the world of work was an urgent global human rights concern that led to the exploitation, vulnerability, precarity of work and ultimate economic inequality of women and other excluded populations and groups, including people targeted based on their gender and sexual orientation.

That, she said, limited fair access to the labour market, increased economic insecurity and kept millions of workers in insecure working conditions.

She indicated that the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) Decent Work Agenda was based on four pillars namely, productive employment, social dialogue, social protection and rights at work.

“Actual violence and harassment, plus the threat of it, in the world of work undermine all of these pillars, including women workers rights to unionize and demand better pay and working conditions.

“Strengthening legal protections against GBV at work is particularly important for young workers, 77 per cent of whom are in informal employment,” she said.

Mr Thomas Wuni Pearson Duanab, the Talensi District Chief Executive (DCE), who received the communique, said there was the need for some Ghanaian cultural practices to be dropped.

He added: “It is the surest way of making us accord women the level of respect that they desired.

“I want to advise women to develop some level of confidence that they will be able to say no for no, and yes for yes,” the DCE said.

Mr Wuni said it was unfortunate that in the 21st Century, there was still issues of GBV and gave the assurance that the communique would be forwarded to policy makers.

Source: Ghana News Agency