Gambian women still get the short end of the stick in a lot of cases - they are the poorest amongst the poor, massively under-represented (though this is changing, in some ways), and still manage to run the nation: cooking, cleaning, washing, doing all the back-breaking work that gets no recognition and no thanks. So any day organized to draw attention to their plight and call for change is a good thing. A nice quote from Dr Touray, the executive director of GAMCOTRAP:
"[Dr Touray] highlighted the concept of Gender Equality, which she said seems to raise a lot of intellectual and political debates, particularly among the epistemologists, as well as men, women and highly placed decision makers who, she said, tend to politicize the issue and thereby miss its essence."
Fighting for Gender Equality (which often as not gets all the men in the conversation to turn away with knowing smirks on their faces) for Gambian women is important, but at the moment it is probably more productive to begin by fighting for just the right to, for example, share some of the housework/babysitting duties with their male partner instead of having to sweep the backyard with the latest baby on their backs, whilst he sits in the living room chewing gerrteh saaf and watching football, after having spent the whole day cooking, cleaning, washing, etc. [if you're a Gambian male reading this and you gasped at the - gasp! - mere idea of sharing the housework with your wife, there's my point, proven].
OK I'm going to stop linking to stories from Freedom, and I know I've made this promise in the past, but I find it extremely hard to pass up the chance to make fun of their stories [exclamation marks and all: they seem to think the more exclamation marks they add to a story the more! believable! it! is!!!].
And right from the first paragraph the slinging starts:
The Gambia Immigration was over the past month training to be able to harass as in the past, people purportedly believe to be without their Alien Card or their Residential or Work permit, the third month of the year.
training to be able to harass people, no less. Who writes these things?
The sad thing is that there actually is a story of note here: it's very disheartening to hear about people from neighboring countries being arrested, roughed up, and deported for not paying an "aliens tax". Where is the "pan-Africanism" in this? [to use a word much beloved by the President and his supporters].
There's a press release about the issue over at foroyaa.
Five Security Agents to Appear Before the Ecowas Community Court in the ?Disappeared? Journalist?s Case [Media Foundation for West Africa]
Accusations and counter-accusations have flown over this one, but it still remains very, very mysterious. Maybe this will help get to the bottom of it (should the security agents actually appear). [more coverage from foroyaa].
Concerning a story we covered in the last news roundup, which was (as usual) wildly over-reported by the usual suspects [hint: their name starts with an F! and they like their exclamation points!!!!]
News story about a "brawl" erupting at ICE [Institute for Continuing Education] high school, which is sad, though the reporter gets rather carried away, calling ICE-students the "flowers of our nation", which was rather stretching the point... But I hope this gets resolved soon.
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