Wolrec prepares women aspirants for 2019 elections

Women’s Legal Resource Centre (Wolrec) project coordinator Tisungane Irene Ntonga has urged political parties and communities to start identifying and empowering women to contest in the 2019 Tripartite Elections.

Ntonga made the call on Friday in Zomba during Wolrec’s Women Empowered for Leadership (WE4L) workshop under the theme Orientation of Potential Women Leaders. The workshop was supported by the Netherlands Government through Hivos.

“Our objective is to train, strengthen and expose the aspiring female candidates so that their communities can develop confidence in them and vote for them in 2019,” she said.

In his remarks, Zomba Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) district governor Sitenala Stima said early publicity of aspiring women is vital in ushering women into power as it gives them enough time to identify people’s needs and align them

with their development goals once voted into power.

Malawi Congress Party (MCP) aspiring councillor for Likangala Ward in Zomba City Munilla Abdulla called on women to work on their weaknesses if they are to confidently represent their communities in decision-making positions.

Participants to the workshop were drawn from various political parties such as DPP, People’s Party (PP), United Democratic Front (UDF), MCP and Alliance for Democracy (Aford). It sought to encourage political parties to support women to fully participate in various societal and decision-making processes, including politics.

Each political party had six women representing it from different parts of the district aspiring to contest as councillors in the next tripartite elections. n