Why Some
Districts are `Female Friendly' in Congressional Races. [United States] Of the 435
members of the House of Representatives, 67 are women -- far more than were there five
decades ago but obviously far fewer than their numbers in the population. In their new
volume, ``Breaking the Political Glass Ceiling: Women and Congressional Elections,'' two
political scientists come up with some genuinely surprising explanations -- and a radical
idea for accelerating a change. Barbara Palmer of American University and Dennis Simon of
Southern Methodist University have looked at every race with a female candidate from 1956
through 2004, searching for the characteristics of the places where women won -- and why.
One finding was predictable. The single biggest barrier to success was simply the fact
that most incumbents are men -- and almost all incumbents win. The success rate of women
running against incumbents is minuscule. In 10,866 House elections during this period,
they found only 13 female Democrats and eight female Republicans who defeated incumbents.
But beyond that, it turns out that there are specific characteristics for districts that
are friendly or hostile to female candidates -- at least as far as white women are
concerned. The scholars could find no significant differences in terms of geography or
social characteristics between those districts that elected African-American men and
African-American women. Almost without exception, they were heavily Democratic, urban and
working class. But the picture is very different for white women. ``Female Democratic
House members tend to win election in districts that are more liberal, more urban, more
diverse, more educated and much wealthier than those won by male Democratic members of the
House,'' they write. ``They come from much more compact, `tonier,' upscale districts than
their male counterparts.'' The map that they showed me and is available on their Web site
(www.politicsandwomen.com) depicts the clustering of those
districts in California, the
Northeast corridor and urban areas from Cleveland
and Detroit through Chicago,
St. Louis, Denver
to Portland and Seattle. |
26
Apr 06: Equal Pay Day. [United
States] Each year, the National Committee on Pay Equity
(NCPE) organizes the national observance of Equal Pay Day to raise awareness about unfair
pay for women and people of color in America. Equal Pay Day is observed in April to
indicate how far into each year a woman must work to earn as much as a man earned in the
previous year. Tuesday symbolizes the day when women's wages catch up to men's wages from
the previous week. Because women on average earn less, they must work longer for the same
pay. For women of color, the wage gap is greater, as shown in our fact sheet. |
More
Working Women Find They Can't Afford to Retire. [United States] Hazel Shoyrer
envisioned retirement as a time for puttering in the garden and traveling. It did not
include scouring the help-wanted ads. But after retiring from her job at a hot dog factory
after 30 years, Shoyrer was hit with health problems that drained her resources. Now, at
67, she needs to find work. "We think it's going to be the golden years, but I keep
looking for the gold," she said with a rueful smile. Shoyrer is among a burgeoning
number of women being forced back into the workplace in their late 60s, 70s and beyond.
The number of women over 65 in the workforce has increased by 38 percent since 1980, while
male participation has remained stable, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
Although the traditional retirement backstops--Social Security, company pensions and
personal savings--have eroded for many Americans, women are particularly vulnerable
because they tend to start working later, earn less and live longer, experts say. For all
the economic gains made by women in recent decades, their average income after age 65 is
about half that of their male counterparts: $12,080 versus $21,100 in 2004. So, whether by
choice or necessity, many are either staying on the job or scrambling to return. |
New Face of War: Female
Amputees. [United
States] Her body had been maimed by war. Dawn Halfaker lay
unconscious at Walter Reed Army Medical
Center, her parents at her bedside and her future
suddenly unsure. A rocket-propelled grenade had exploded in her Humvee, ravaging her arm
and shoulder. In June 2004, she became the newest soldier on a path almost unknown
in the U.S.:
a female combat amputee. It was a distinction she did not dwell on during days of intense
pain and repeated surgeries, or even as she struggled to eat on her own, write left-handed
and use an artificial limb. But scattered among her experiences were moments when she was
aware that few women before her had rethought their lives, their bodies, their choices, in
this way. She was part of a new generation of women who have lost pieces of themselves in
war, experiencing the same physical trauma and psychological anguish as their male
counterparts. But for female combat amputees has come something else: a quiet sense of
wonder about how the public views them and how they will reconcile themselves. Their
numbers are small, 11 in three years of war, compared with more than 350 men. They are not
quite a band of sisters, but more a chain of women linked by history, experience and fate.
They have discovered, at various points of their recovery, that gender has made a
difference "not better or worse," as Halfaker put it, "just
different." |
Women
Reject Racial Bias Case Settlement. [United States] Three women who accused the Town
of Greenwich of racial
bias in a beach access case have rejected
a settlement proposed by
the state's civil rights agency. The state Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities
held a hearing Tuesday to approve a settlement it had reached over claims that three women
were denied access to Greenwich Point Park last summer on the basis of the color of their
skin. However, the three women, Claudette Rothman, Millie Bonilla and Sheila Foster,
indicated they didn't want to sign the settlement because they want the town to apologize
and admit that it did something wrong. "The individual complainants are not inclined
to sign off on the agreement," R. Hamisi Ingram, executive director of the human
rights commission said Wednesday. Under the proposed settlement, Greenwich Affirmative
Action Officer Kelly Houston and other employees in the town's Human Resources and Parks
departments would be required to attend anti-discrimination training classes. |
Tax Law Pushes 'Secondary
Earners' to Drop Out. [United States] Before joint filing,
the United States used a
system of "separate filing" for married couples in which tax rates applied to
each spouse's income separately. (This is not to be confused with today's "married,
filing separately" category that is used in rare circumstances like when one spouse
wants to avoid the tax problems of the other.) When the war ended and the costs of war
went away, Congress saw an opportunity to reduce taxes, and they wanted to encourage
mothers who had entered the work force during the war to go back home. One move--making
joint filing mandatory--addressed both goals by lowering taxes on families with only one
earner thus discouraging women from working. The Legislative Counsel of the Treasury at
the time remarked that, "Wives need not continue to master the details of . . .
business, but may turn . . . to the pursuit of homemaking." The joint filing policy
hasn't changed since. Because of joint filing, secondary earners in a marriage--still
predominantly women--are taxed at significantly higher tax rates than their spouses. |
Battered Wives' Pets are the
Latest Victims of Domestic Violence. [United States] Susan Walsh told Maine
legislators a chilling tale in January. She said she had wanted to take her two children
and leave her husband, ending a relationship she found frightening and controlling, but
she was afraid he would harm the animals on their Blessed Be
Farm in Ellsworth, Maine. In
the past, she said in an interview, he had retaliated against her by running over her
blind and deaf Border collie, shooting two sheep and wringing the necks of her prize
turkeys. "It wasn't just the cats and the dogs I had, it was the sheep and the
chickens - I was terrified for their welfare," said Walsh, 50, who is now divorced.
"I knew if I were to leave, he wouldn't hesitate to kill them. He had done it
before." Experts on domestic violence say accounts like hers are not unusual. They
say many men who abuse wives or girlfriends threaten or harm their animals to coerce or
control the women. |
Sex,
Lies, and Government Health Literature for Young Women. [United States] Can young
women trust government reports on women's health? This month's issue of Glamour magazine
says "No." In an article entitled "The New Lies About Women's Health,"
the magazine reports that the federal government has posted inaccurate information on
federal government websites used widely by young women and that states are now passing
laws requiring doctors to give inaccurate information to young women seeking birth control
and abortions. Four states, according to Glamour, have passed so-called "Women's
Right to Know" laws: Texas, Kansas, Montana, and Mississippi. Doctors counseling
women seeking abortions in those states must give them government-sponsored pamphlets that
say the risk of breast cancer is increased by abortion. The magazine says that is a
supposedly "scientific" claim made by a researcher funded by the antiabortion
movement and thoroughly discredited by the medical establishment. Glamour quotes a Texas
doctor who says, "The conversation I have is that, 'This is what is written in the
pamphlet. I disagree with it ethically and scientifically, but this is what the
legislation has forced upon me. That's all I can say.... If I want to be consistent with
the law, I have to lie.' " Twenty-four-hour waiting periods for women seeking
abortions are widespread and well-known. But this is the first mention I've seen of state
laws requiring doctors to give out inaccurate information. There's more. Glamour also
reminds us about inaccurate information widely disseminated in federally funded
abstinence-only sex education classes. It cites a report released last year by Rep. Henry
Waxman, a California Democrat, which found that "nearly 70 percent [of those classes]
include 'serious medical or scientific errors' such as claims that 'up to 10 percent of
women become sterile after an abortion' and that 'premature birth, a major cause of mental
retardation, is increased following the abortion of a first pregnancy.' " |
'Roe v.
Wade': The Divided States of America. [United States] Two hours after South Dakota
Gov. Mike Rounds signed an abortion ban last month, NARAL Pro-Choice America blasted an
e-mail to its supporters: "Is your state next?" The South Dakota legislation and
the abortion rights group's warning are early skirmishes in a battle over what states
would do if the landmark Roe v. Wade decision were overturned though both sides
concede that may never happen. If it does, a fight that for three decades has focused on
nine members of the Supreme Court would be waged instead among more than 7,000 legislators
in 50 state capitals. "Now is the time to get moving on this in Ohio," says Tom
Brinkman, a state legislator who has introduced a bill to ban almost all abortions.
Meanwhile, Kellie Copeland of NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio is braced. "Our supporters feel
the fight is coming back to the states," she says. What would states do? The
conclusions: Twenty-two state legislatures are likely to impose significant new
restrictions on abortion. They include nearly every state in the South and a swath of big
states across the industrial Rust Belt, from Pennsylvania
to Ohio and Michigan.
These
states have enacted most of the abortion restrictions now allowed. Nine states are
considering bans similar to the one passed in South Dakota it's scheduled to go
into effect July 1 and four states are debating restrictions that would be
triggered if the Supreme Court overturned Roe. Sixteen state legislatures are likely
to continue current access to abortion. They include every state on the West Coast and
almost every state in the Northeast. A half-dozen already have passed laws that
specifically protect abortion rights. Most of the states in this group have enacted fewer
than half of the abortion restrictions now available to states. Twelve states fall
into a middle ground between those two categories. About half are in the Midwest, the rest
scattered from Arizona to Rhode Island. The result, according to this analysis, would be
less a patchwork of laws than broad regional divisions that generally reinforce the
nation's political split. All but three of the states likely to significantly restrict
abortions voted for President Bush in 2004. All but four of the states likely to maintain
access to abortion voted for Democrat John Kerry. The 22 states likely to enact new
restrictions include 50% of the U.S.
population and accounted for 37% of the abortions
performed in 2000, the latest year for which complete data were available. The 16 states
likely to protect access to abortion include 35% of the U.S. population and accounted for
48% of the abortions performed. |
Abortion
Debate Shuns Prevention. [United
States]
As two senators on opposite sides of the
abortion debate, we recognize that one side will not suddenly convince the other to drop
its deeply held beliefs. And we believe that, while disagreeing, we can work together to
find common ground. We believe that it is necessary for all Americans to join together and
embrace policies that will reduce the number of unintended pregnancies, decrease abortions
and improve access to women's health care. There is no question that the rate of
unintended pregnancy is too high in the United
States. Half of the 6 million pregnancies
each year in this country are unintended, and nearly half of these unplanned pregnancies
end in abortion. It doesn't have to be this way. Most of these unintended pregnancies --
and the resulting abortions -- can be prevented if we eliminate the barriers that prevent
women from having access to affordable and effective contraception. In the Senate, we have
long championed the Prevention First Act. This legislation would help to reduce the rates
of unintended pregnancy in our nation, decrease abortions and improve access to women's
health care. Our proposal includes common- ground, common-sense policies. It makes
family-planning services more accessible to low-income women. It improves awareness and
understanding of emergency contraception, a poorly understood yet highly effective form of
contraception. It ensures that government-funded sex education programs provide medically
accurate information about contraception. It also ends insurance discrimination against
women. Right now, many policies cover Viagra, but not prescription contraceptives. That is
wrong, and our legislation will change it. Ironically, those advocating the loudest for an
outright ban on abortion are too often the same people who oppose prevention initiatives
and instead support making contraception less accessible, particularly for low-income
women who are more likely to have unplanned pregnancies. |
Realtors
Applaud; Women and Patients' Groups Oppose It. [United States] The struggle to control
health-care costs appears headed in a new direction: deregulation. Aiming to make health
plans more affordable for small employers, Congress is considering a far-reaching reform
that would give insurers a new right to scale back benefits, which could affect nearly
everyone's health plans, policy analysts said. A federal bill that would preempt
state-mandated benefits is pitting advocacy groups such as the American Diabetes
Association and AARP against powerful small-business lobbies such as the National
Association of Realtors and the National Federation of Independent Business. The Health
Insurance Marketplace Modernization and Affordability Act was introduced by Sen. Mike
Enzi, R-Wyo., and co-sponsored by Ben Nelson, D-Neb., and Conrad Burns, R-Mont. It would
allow private insurers to bypass state regulations requiring coverage of things such as
preventive cancer screenings, diabetes supplies and routine women's health care. Insurers
also would have to offer an "enhanced" plan that's at least as comprehensive as
the state employee plan in one of the five most populous states, though the bill sets up
no enforcement mechanism, said Mila Kofman, associate research professor at Georgetown
University Health Policy Institute. "This bill is the most fundamental reform effort
we've seen in probably two decades out of Congress," Kofman said, noting it may
increase the number of medical-bill-related personal bankruptcies. With insurers free to
pursue the most profitable options without regard to state oversight, the bill "will
lead to people who are either underinsured -- they just don't have enough coverage -- or
completely uninsured for certain conditions," she said. "It's great for Wall
Street, but it's not what businesses and workers need." The bill also would allow
broader rating criteria than what's currently allowed in many states, letting insurers set
rates for small groups based on gender, age, health status, geography -- even by industry.
Without receiving a hearing, the bill is expected to come up for a Senate vote in early
May. In an election year when lawmakers are itching for a health-care plan to take home to
their constituents, critics worry that hasty passage may worsen the system's problems. |
Lawsuit
Accuses Lawry's of Barring Men. [United
States] The Lawry's steakhouse chain was sued
for allegedly barring men from being servers at its restaurants, the U.S. Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission said. The agency said Tuesday that it filed a sex discrimination
suit in federal court in Los Angeles
on Friday because Pasadena-based Lawry's Restaurants,
Inc., has continued a policy that dates back to 1938 of using only women servers.
"The practice of denying men the opportunity to work in the higher-paying server jobs
is blatant sex discrimination," Anna Park, an attorney for the commission, said in a
statement. Lawry's waitresses can earn from $25,000 to $56,000 a year depending on tips
while busboys and others typically earn about 40 percent less, she said Wednesday. The
suit could involve several thousand people, she added. |
Anchor's
Chair Was an Irresistible Lure for Couric. [United States] In the midst of the widely
publicized negotiations over her future career in network television, Katie Couric called
a family meeting, with her parents and two young daughters around the dinner table. Laying
out her options whether to stay on at NBC, where she had achieved enormous success
as a co-host of "Today," or to join CBS, which was offering her the position of
anchor of the evening newscast Ms. Couric explained to her daughters that should
she take the CBS job her schedule would change radically from morning work hours to
evening work hours and certainly the family routine of early dinners together would be
disrupted. That the most important people in her life had confirmed her own inclinations
surely made it easier for Ms. Couric to decide, as she did officially yesterday, that she
would leave the job she had thrived in and loved for the last 15 years for the uncertain,
riskier, but historically significant step of becoming the first woman to be the voice and
face of an American network news division. Friends, colleagues and others directly
involved in Ms. Couric's decision-making described her discussions and experiences on the
basis of anonymity because of the confidentiality of the negotiations. Several of them
said Ms. Couric never made too much of the concept of a breakthrough for women at the
anchor desk. She did say it was a "cool idea," but emphasized that it was not
the crucial factor in making her decision. |
Andy
Rooney to Katie: Welcome to CBS, Now Get Out. [United States] In an appearance today
on "Imus in the Morning," Andy Rooney quickly turned down the temperature in the
CBS newsroom. Don Imus: "So what do you think of these changes at CBS News?"
Andy Rooney: "Im not enthusiastic about it. I think everybody likes Katie
Couric, I mean how can you not like Katie Couric. But, I dont know anybody at CBS
News who is pleased that shes coming here." |
The
Women of 'Big Love'. [United
States] There was something about playing the three wives
on "Big Love," HBO's polygamy drama, that made three fine actresses answer:
"I do," "I do," "I do." "I was really shocked at myself
for signing on without knowing where it was gonna go, or much of anything else," says
Chloe Sevigny, who co-stars with Jeanne Tripplehorn and Ginnifer Goodwin in this
unconventionally devout series (following "The Sopranos" at 10 p.m. EDT Sundays;
HBO, like CNN, is a division of Time Warner). "But after reading the pilot, I was so
moved by it," she continues during a recent communal interview. "And I was
fascinated by my character" -- Nicki, the sulky middle wife of Salt Lake City
merchant and father of seven Bill Henrickson, played by Bill Paxton. |
Power Platforms Make
Every Woman an Amazon. [United
States] This was going to be great, I told myself. I
was going to march into Michael's on West
55th Street, wearing the highest heels to come
out of Paris, Lanvin's peep-toe
stilettos with 5½-inch cone heels and a 2-inch platform,
and they were all going to look up from their Cobb salads with demiportions of Roquefort
and - well, it was going to be great. Even for someone who is used to wearing stilettos
and monster platforms, the shoes for spring present a special challenge. You just can't
escape the fact that they are taller, more outrageous, involving a great deal more design
and expense but also, it must be said, a great many more opportunities to humiliate
yourself. Who pictures herself on a gurney? And how do you explain it? "It's not like
you broke your leg skiing in St.
Moritz," Candy Pratts Price, the editor of
Style.com, said the other night. "That's a good story. But 'I fell off my
platforms'?" Price smirked. The desire to be taller, Amazonian, seems to fit with a
society that likes things pumped up - lips an5d SUVs, for example - but that is only a
conjecture. A lot of women, in truth, don't need a McLuhan-like explanation of why they
want the new shoes. Lisa Anastasia Reisman, who is blond and tan, was in Barneys recently,
shopping with girlfriends. She had on a pair of jeans and an aqua sweater with black peace
symbols on it. She strapped on a pair of 5-inch, or almost 13-centimeter, Dolce &
Gabbana platforms with little flowers embroidered on the sides and stood up. "Now I'm
tall," said Reisman, who is 5 feet 3, or about 1.6 meters, as she set off in the
direction of the Lanvin display. Then there is Esther Chetrit, a mother of five. Earlier
this month, Chetrit was at Bergdorf Goodman. She had already been to Saks Fifth Avenue,
where she bought a pair of Yves Saint Laurent heels - "the bondage ones," she
said - and now she was on the plumped cushions at Bergdorf, in her jeans and bare feet,
looking down at a pair of python and cork platforms from Power Oscar de la Renta and
another style, from Azzedine Alaļa, with black patent leather straps and a curving
raffia- covered heel. |
Women's College
Basketball: Maryland
Stuns Duke for NCAA Title. [United
States] The improbability of Maryland's stunning,
why-not-us drive for a national championship came to a head in one amazing play Tuesday
night. With time running out in regulation, the 5-foot-7 freshman guard Kristi Toliver
dribbled around two screens and shot a 3-pointer right over Duke's biggest barrier, the
6-7 center Alison Bales. When it sailed smoothly through the basket with 6.1 seconds left,
it capped a comeback from a 13-point second-half deficit and sent the game into overtime,
where Toliver and another freshman, Marissa Coleman, each hit two free throws to seal a
78-75 victory. "In my opinion, big-time players want the ball in big-time
situations," Toliver said. "So I wanted to take
the shot." Maryland won its
first national title, stunning Duke, its far more experienced Atlantic Coast Conference
rival. This was Duke's fourth trip to the Final Four without winning a single title,
keeping Coach Gail Goestenkors without a victory in two national championship games and
ending the decorated career of the fifth-year senior Monique Currie in heartbreak. |
Keith Hernandez: 'Women Don't Belong
In Dugout'. [United
States] New York Mets broadcaster Keith Hernandez's comment that
women "don't belong in the dugout" drew criticism Sunday from San Diego Padres
manager Bruce Bochy, who supported the female member of his training staff and said he was
surprised her gender even came up. Hernandez made the remark during the second inning of New
York's 8-1 victory in San
Diego on Saturday night. Mike Piazza homered for the Padres and
exchanged a high-five in the dugout with 33-year-old Kelly Calabrese, the Padres' massage
therapist. "Who is the girl in the dugout, with the long hair?" Hernandez said.
"What's going on here? You have got to be kidding me. Only player personnel in the
dugout." Hernandez found out later in the broadcast that Calabrese was with the
Padres training staff. "I won't say that women belong in the kitchen, but they don't
belong in the dugout," Hernandez said. |
Muslim
Women Ask Gym to Keep Single-Sex Pledge. [United States] About 200 Muslim women have
asked the Fitness USA workout chain to honor what they say was its promise to provide
separate exercise times for women and men. They say they need single-sex workout times to
accommodate Islam's standards of modesty. Arrwa Mogalli, 28, of Dearborn, Michigan, said
that she agreed to buy a $1,465 lifetime membership with the chain after being promised
that its Lincoln Park facility
would be open only to women on certain days. This month,
the gym in this southern Detroit suburb
decided to open up a new part of the center to
both sexes every day. Mogalli is among about 200 women with Fitness USA memberships who
have signed a petition asking the chain to restore single-sex exercise days for the entire
gym or to put up a divider so men and women cannot see each other while exercising. |
NASCAR
Marketing to Female Fan Base. [United
States] A burger-grilling, beer-drinking,
RV-driving man who loves the smell of burning fuel and hot tire rubber. That's the
stereotypical image of a NASCAR fan. But if they all looked like that, fashion designer
Nicole Miller wouldn't create a NASCAR-inspired high heel. Harlequin wouldn't launch a
series of novels featuring hunky stock car drivers. And the new company TrackCouture would
sew boxy, men's T-shirts instead of skirts and fitted pink tank tops. As fans hit Phoenix
International Raceway for this weekend's NASCAR race, expect to see a lot more women at
the track than in years past. And anticipate more female-friendly NASCAR products
encouraging women to pry open their pocketbooks. Women make up about 40 percent of NASCAR
fans and are flocking to the sport more than any other demographic, NASCAR spokesman
Andrew Giangola said. "People see this large, loyal, growing fan base," he said,
"and recognize the opportunity to target women." |
'NYT'
Sunday Preview: Madeleine Albright Can Leg-Press 400 Pounds. [United States] In an
interview in the The New York Times Magazine that will appear this coming Sunday,
Madeleine Albright reveals, among other things, that even at 68, she works out three times
a week "and I can leg-press up to 400 pounds." This follows a discussion of how
she does not expect to re-marry, partly because, as she says, "I'm intimidating,
don't you think?" |
How Can You Tell If You're
Becoming Militarized? Some Feminist Clues. [Canada] How can you shape what women do
"naturally"? How can you keep wages low based on presumptions of ideology of the
"dutiful daughter"? How can you tell if you are becoming militarized? These are
the kind of questions being asked by American political scientist and author Cynthia
Enloe, a visiting professor of women's studies and political science at York University in
Canada, invited by
the OSIE department at University of Toronto to give a lecture
intriguingly called "How Can You Tell If You're Becoming Militarized? Some Feminist
Clues." Through her research Professor Enloe has realized that it is not just
governments who have a stake in what women can be made to do "naturally" but
that this extends to schools, companies, Churches and even families. She has also come to
appreciate that it is much harder to make women and girls do the kind of things that are
in the vested interest of these institutions than we may think at first. This difficulty,
she says, speaks to the underestimated power of women which is revealed by asking feminist
questions. |
First Female Chief
Judge Named. [Canada] Merit,
not gender,
will make family and youth court Judge Gail
Vickery Alberta's first female provincial
court chief judge, Justice Minister Ron Stevens
said yesterday. Stevens said Vickery will assume the title May 12, when current Chief
Judge Ernie Walters completes his seven-year stint as provincial court's top man. Stevens
said it was only a matter of time before a woman took the helm to administer the three
divisions of provincial court. Vickery will oversee the judges who sit in the provincial
criminal division, as well as small claims and family and youth courts. Stevens said
Vickery's appointment is precedent-setting, but her gender did not play a role in getting
her the post. "You can't be unmindful of the fact that you're breaking new
ground," he said. "But that's not why she was selected -- she was selected
because she's a demonstrated leader." He said the makeup of the legal profession has
changed during the past 30 years and the appointments of women to the bench and to top
positions shows that. |
Women Have a
Crucial Role to Play. [Mexico]
Millions of women and girls in poor countries walk an average of six kilometres a day to
carry 20 litres of water on average to their homes. Millions of others drop out of school
because of the lack of private and separate sanitation facilities. Taking women into
account in projects aimed at improving access to water, sanitation and hygiene would help
them to lift themselves out of poverty. If women participated in defining these plans, it
would multiply the benefit to the community, according to a report presented at the Mar.
16-22 Fourth World Water Forum in Mexico. Water services "are more effective if women
have an active role," states the document entitled "For Her It's The Big Issue:
Putting women at the centre of water supply, sanitation and hygiene," published by
the non governmental Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC),
headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland. This isn't just theory. With women's participation,
any kind of project is easier, said Maria Mutagamba, Uganda's minister for Water and
president of the African Ministers Council on Water. In "my country and in
Africa" at large, there is much work to be done in sanitation, but this challenge is
surmounted more easily when women are involved, the minister stated during the
presentation of the report over the weekend. |
Argentine
Experts Study Juarez Murder Remains.
[Mexico] As many as
400 women in Ciudad Juarez--just
across the border from El Paso, Texas--have been slain since 1993, and their deaths are
considered unsolved murder cases. More than 100 have been found dumped in the desert with
signs of sexual torture. A team of Argentine forensic experts--which gained fame by using
advanced DNA-study techniques to identify people killed in Argentina's "dirty
war" of the 1970s--is studying the remains of about 60 women, including those
believed to be of Esmeralda, for either first-time identification or to verify previous
identifications by state authorities. Esther Chavez, founder and head
of Casa Amiga, a Juarez
center for abused women, also hopes that positive identifications could give victims'
families the ammunition to keep pushing for prosecution of the authorities who haven't
found any credible suspects. |
Portia Sets Cabinet
to Work. [Jamaica]
Jamaicas new
prime minister said she expects her Cabinet to quickly get down to work
during a swearing-in ceremony yesterday for the government ministers. Portia Simpson
Miller, the countrys first woman prime minister, retained most of the Cabinet from
the previous administration of PJ Patterson, although she dropped the chiefs of the
development and housing ministries. This must be an action Cabinet for I intend to
lead an action team, said Simpson Miller, who has added the womens affairs
minister position to her responsibilities, while keeping her post as sports minister.
I have put on my working shoes so you had better put on your working shoes.
Simpson Miller, popularly known as Sista P, beat three opponents to take over
leadership of the ruling Peoples National Party from Patterson, who
led Jamaica for
14 years. She was sworn-in on Thursday night before thousands of people, pledging to root
out corruption, protect human rights, and rid Jamaica of the violent crime plaguing the
country. |
Another Step
Forward for Region's Women. [Trinidad] In
just about two weeks time, an historic
changing of the guard is due to take place in the Caricom member state
of Jamaica, where
for the first time in that country's history a woman will assume the duties as Prime
Minister. Portia Simpson Miller's assumption of the office will be a red letter day for
women across the region, even though she has been twice preceded in other Caricom member
states. Eugenia Charles presided with great dignity, strength and purpose as Prime
Minister of the Commonwealth of
Dominica during the 1980s. Then in the 1990s Janet Jagan
served for a brief period as President of Guyana. Ms Simpson-Miller has already outlined
some of her thoughts about the formation of a Cabinet in her administration and has
signalled her intention of making a difference in her country's political direction. |