Antigua and Barbuda: Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party have announced different plans and programmes for the upliftment of women in different fields or for women empowerment as a whole in their manifesto launched for the January 18 general elections.
Read Here: Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party plans for women empowerment
The leadership of the UPP, has shown absolute contempt for women in our society. Among the ranks of the UPP candidates are a known murderer, I who killed one of our young women and her unborn child; two rapists and other known criminal activists who are known women abusers.
Remarkably, even the women leaders in the UPP, who claim to be feminists, and those who are trying to compete as candidates in the January 2023 general elections, have been silent at the abuse of their sister women in our society.
Any person, seeking to represent a constituency and to play a role in government, should mirror the values and principles by which the constituency and the people of Antigua and Barbuda stand.
By their utterances and behaviour, the UPP candidates have no regard for our grandmothers, mothers, aunts, sisters, wives, and women as the equals of men. They believe that our women and girls should be insulted, disrespected, and abused.
In this connection, Harold Lovell and the women leaders and candidates of the UPP, bring themselves into question, concerning their lack of commitment to standing-up for the rights of women in Antigua and
Barbuda.
What, therefore, will the UPP’s real position be on gender equality; on equal pay for women; on recognition that women carry children to birth
and must, therefore, be accorded rights? This is a question that the electorate of Antigua and Barbuda must seriously analyze. On the present evidence, the UPP team does not even pay lip service to women’s rights. They downright encourage women abuse.
ABLP UPHOLDS AND PROMOTES WOMEN’S RIGHTS
By contrast with the evident UPP disregard for women in our society, the ABLP enjoys a record of respecting and promoting women, and of continuing to advance them. It was the ABLP that advanced women into leadership roles in the public service, such that today many of the Permanent Secretaries and Heads of Key agencies, including the Chairman of the Port Authority, the Chief Immigration Officer, the Labour Commissioner, the CEO of the Airport Authority, the Chief Medical Officer,
Supervisor of Elections, the Chief Health Inspector, and the CEO of the Citizenship by Investment Unit, are women.
Additionally, the ABLP implements a policy of gender balance among its appointed representatives to the Senate, and openly encourages women to seek election to the House.
In the context of social protection, the ABLP is also resolved to implement a policy of continuing to promote gender equality so that neither gender is left behind. These positions already form part of the ABLP government‘s medium-term development strategy.
Women continue to be recognized and advanced by an ABLP administration. Next Level development is respectful of the crucial and equal role that women play in all aspects of our nation’s life of Representatives.
The ABLP leader has already announced that, when the party’s four women candidates are elected by their constituencies in January 2023 general elections, they will all be appointed as Cabinet Ministers. This is consistent with the ABLP’s strategic goals for Next-Level development which includes: Improvement of social protection services, gender, and youth empowerment to alleviate poverty and reduce vulnerabilities.
