[It is true that Black Women often hold Black families together when the men do nothing – so I agree with their point of view. Here women are saying it is Black men who are the problem. Jan]

By Allan Kisia

African men have been blamed for the continent™s problems.

A regional women™s conference further accused the men of being responsible for the poverty in Africa.

The over 100 women, representing 18 countries, said on Tuesday that African men claimed to be the family heads yet it was the women who sustain homes.

The participants claimed that men misuse donor funds and their countries™ resources, sparking conflicts, which result in the suffering of women and children.

The women were speaking at the end of a two-day forum, dubbed African Women Millennium Initiative, in Limuru. The conference addressed increasing poverty, plundering of the continent™s resources, abuse of human rights and ravages of Aids, tuberculosis and malaria

This is the first forum where African women have spoken about the Millennium Development Goals.

“We are tired, overworked, sick and fed-up and say enough is enough,” said a Ugandan participant.

Vice-President Moody Awori and Health minister Charity Ngilu were also present.

The delegates said women are under-represented in governments and are not involved in decision-making.

Ngilu regretted that there were only three Kenyan female Cabinet ministers out of 30 ministries.

“How can the three of us take on 27 men? We are bound to fail in advocating for women™s issues,” she said.

Former Zambian Transport minister Professor Nkandu Luo, said Africa would not achieve its development goals if women continued to be marginalized.

Lumumba Esi, from Cote d™Ivoire, said West African women were impoverished even as their leaders borrow heavily from donor communities.

Source: The Standard
URL: http://www.eastandard.net/hm_news/news.php?ar…/p>