Empowering women in Angola
Published: Feb 24, 2020 Reading time: 2 minutes
After three years of work, a People in Need (PIN) project in Angola is having a measurable impact on gender equality. Today, more women’s organizations are present in decision-making spaces, local authorities are recognizing the role of young women’s associations, and the general public is more aware of women’s rights.
As part of the initiative, PIN organized training courses for young female leaders and meetings to exchange ideas, drawing support from a wide range of stakeholders. “We’re able to include women in dialogue and decision-making spaces, where they can express their opinion,” says Ludovina Nunda, PIN’s Gender and Civil Society Program Manager. “This is also a result of better self-esteem; when women know their rights, they’re more confident to defend those rights and speak to other women about them.“
During a recent event marking the project’s culmination, Tomáš Uličný, the European Union Ambassador to Angola, praised the initiative’s successes. “Strengthening the role of women is always an advantage for the whole society,” he said. “Even though the project is being concluded, we believe that the objective of promoting and supporting women’s civil society organizations to act together as agents of change for inclusive public policies and good governance with regard to gender equality won’t end. It’s a continuous process.”
Empowering women in Angola
Anne van Leeuwen, the Netherlands Ambassador to Angola, said that “the structure of the project is that People in Need is like an umbrella, and under that umbrella there are many smaller civil society organizations. In that manner, it can trickle down to a lot of places in Angola and strengthen civil society organizations with the assistance of PIN.”
During the project, PIN supported 120 women directly and reached about 30,000 people in total, through activities implemented in the provinces of Bié and Huíla.
The initiative, funded by the European Union and the Embassy of the Netherlands in Angola, and in partnership with the Angolan organization ASY (Soka Yola Association), was the last phase of a work in gender and civil society sector, which started back in 2013. Previous actions were focused on the creation of income-generating activities for vulnerable women and the empowerment of civil society organizations so they can represent the needs of their communities in dialogue with local authorities. The fight against domestic violence was present in the activities since the beginning of the programme.
