Women urged to use digital technologies for self-empowerment, combat violence.

The call was re-echoed during separate restitution workshops organised from July 12 to 26. 

The different workshops were organised as a follow up of a national forum on the role of digital technologies and innovation in promoting gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.

The workshops were organised by the Cameroon Indigenous Women’s Forum, CAIWOF. This was in collaboration with all the regional delegations of the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications and the Ministry of Women’s Empowerment and the Family.

Regional branches of the Cameroon Human Rights Commission, CDHC, also assisted in the workshops that were organised in the towns of Mandjou, Maroua, Garoua, Tibati, Douala, Yaounde amongst others.

According to the Executive Director of CAIWOF, Bouba Aiesatou, the objective was to explain to participants the importance of ICT in the empowerment of women and girls and to present its role in the fight against violence, including GBV.

Citing statistics from the National Agency for Information and Communication Technologies, ANTIC, Bouba explained that the internet penetration rate in Cameroon as of 2022 stood at 36.5% and out of this, women accounted for 41.6% of social networking users, compared with 58.4% for men. 

She emphasised that bridging the digital divide between men and women is crucial to achieving many of the Sustainable Development Goals, SDGs. 

“Achieving the ambitious SDGs, particularly those relating to gender equality and women's empowerment, requires far-reaching changes, integrated approaches and new solutions,” she first stated, adding that: “Based on current trajectories, current interventions will not be enough to achieve a 50-50 world by 2030 but innovative approaches that challenge the status quo are crucial to achieving the SDGs and benefiting everyone”.

She said women’s rights activists are using the internet, cell phones and other technologies to strengthen their campaigns and advocacy, extend their networks, prevent violations and support victims' recovery. 

“Social networks and mobiles in particular enable women's rights groups to reach new constituencies. Building women's capacity to use technology and innovation to promote and defend women's rights is more than necessary in the current context,” she added.

She specified that “we touched 200 women-led organisations as participants from the 10 regions of Cameroon. The restitution is as a result of the national forum to reached out to more grassroots women”.

Besides improving the participants’ knowledge of ICTs, it is hoped that women and girls’ usage of ICTs will increased and cases of violence, including gender-based violence, will reduce. 

This story was first published in The Guardian Post issue No:3200 of Friday August 16, 2024