AWD Report 2020
8.2. Women’s Rights Mechanisms (Treaties, Laws, Policies, Strategies, Campaigns) SADC has developed a strong women’s rights framework and mechanisms. The SADC Treaty includes relevant provisions on women and girls’ rights and gender equality. Article 6(2) prohibits discrimination against any person based on, among others, gender. Article 12 of the Treaty states that it is the responsibility of the Sectoral and Cluster Ministerial Committees to oversee the activities of the core areas of integration, which include, health and HIV/AIDS, education and gender.455 In 1997, SADC adopted the Declaration on Gender and Development, which addresses several areas of women’s rights. The Declaration calls on Member States to increase women’s participation in politics and decision-making to at least 30% by 2005, to repeal and reform all discriminatory laws, to amend constitutions and to reform social practices. States should also promote women’s full access to and control over productive resources such as land, livestock and markets; address, prevent and eradicate violence against women and children; promote women and girls’ access to education; and cultivate and promote a culture of gender equality and respect for the human rights of women and girls in the SADC region.456 The Addendum to the SADC Declaration on Gender and Development on the Prevention and Eradication of Violence Against Women, adopted in 1998, amended the Declaration. Additionally, the SADC Gender Policy, adopted in 2003, provides a framework for achieving the goals of the Declaration, and for institutionalising and operationalising gender as a key development strategy for achieving gender equality, equity and women and girls’ empowerment among the members.457 To strengthen SADC’s commitment to women and girls’ rights and gender equality, in 2008 the Member States adopted the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development, a binding legal and policy framework. The Protocol has 11 key thematic areas: constitutional and legal rights; governance (representation and participation); education and training; productive resources and employment; economic empowerment; GBV; health (SRH and reproductive rights); HIV/AIDS; peacebuilding and conflict resolution; media, information and communication; and implementation.458 It sets up 28 targets to achieve women and girls’ rights and gender equality to reach by 2015.459 One of these concerns the elimination of GBV. Article 20 calls on Member States to, among others, enact and enforce legislation prohibiting all forms of GBV; ensure the laws on GBV provide for the comprehensive testing, treatment and care of survivors of sexual assault; review and reform their criminal laws and procedures applicable to cases of sexual offence and GBV; enact and adopt specific legislative provisions to prevent human trafficking and provide a holistic service to the victims, with the aim of reintegrating them into society; enact legislative provisions, and adopt and implement policies, strategies and programmes that define and prohibit sexual harassment in all spheres and provide deterrent sanctions for perpetrators of sexual harassment; and adopt integrated approaches, including institutional cross-sector structures, with the aim of reducing current levels of GBV by half by 2015.460 In 2016, the Protocol was amended to align with Agenda 2063, the SDGs and Beijing+20. The amended Protocol includes a specific provision on health, SRH and reproductive rights and explicitly refers to reducing maternal mortality.461 The region’s gender ministers adopted a Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting Framework that set out 121 gender indicators at various levels to monitor progress towards achieving gender equality by 2017.462 Concerning women, peace and security, in 2018 SADC adopted the Regional Strategy on Women, Peace and Security 2018–2022. This serves as a guide on mainstreaming gender into regional peace and security systems, programmes and processes and aims to ensure the full participation of women and children. Furthermore, together with the accompanying action plan, the Strategy calls on Member States to develop national action plans on the implementation of UNSCRs and to mobilise resources to implement proposed activities at the national level.463 Additionally, SADC has implemented several frameworks on specific rights areas such as political participation (2009 SADC Framework for Achieving Gender Parity in Political and Decision-Making Positions by 2015), development (Revised Regional
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