Good afternoon, I am very pleased that we have successfully come to the end of our two-day virtual meeting. This is the first time we are meeting in this fashion and we have demonstrated that, despite the challenges posed by COVID-19, which limit our physical interactions that are warmer, we can still engage and have productive deliberations. I thank all of you, for your active participation and contributions. In the two days meeting we have launched the second report of the African Union Commission Chairperson on the status of the women peace and security agenda in Africa. The report highlighted the progress we have made, remaining gaps and gave us recommendation for accelerating implementation. It is my sincere hope that the report will contribute to your efforts of advancing the women peace and security agenda in your countries and by large in Africa.
Ladies and gentlemen, Through the various speakers, we were repeatedly called to accelerate implementation actions, we were also reminded of the great responsibility we have to ensure the WPS agenda is mainstreamed in the various planning and financing frameworks of our governments, one of the ways we will be assured of implementation. We also discussed how we will strengthen our accountability mechanisms to ensure the agenda is delivering results to our women and girls including by tracking results and collecting data using the CRF and other existing monitoring frameworks at National Level. My office is ready and willing to support the WPS monitoring capacities. In this vein, my office has planned capacity building initiatives on the use of the CRF in data collection and reporting, and will be visiting some of you to consult deeply on the existing gaps. I urge you to give my team maximum cooperation as you have always done. Ladies and gentlemen, During the meeting we also initiated the reporting cycle for 2020 and 2021. My office will send communications through the usual channels and I look forward to receiving the reports in 2022. In today’s session, we heard the exciting experiences from some of our governments and regional economic commission and mechanisms. I hope we will domesticate the useful tips they shared. Our speakers from the civil society reminded us of the great contribution and responsibility they have in advancing the agenda; indeed, we must strengthen our collaboration with them throughout the WPS implementation cycle both at national and regional level. I also urge the civil society to hold our governments into account in addition to the great advocacy work they are already doing in the area of the WPS. I was encouraged to hear about the great work of the young women in the implementation of the South Sudan peace accord, I am inspired by their resilience. And I urge our governments to include the young women consistently and deliberately in all processes of peacebuilding, conflict prevention, resolution and reconstruction as well as in COVID -19 reconstruction. Ladies and gentlemen, Allow me to once again express my gratitude to our partners, the UN Women, UNDP, Norway, USA for their generous support to my office. Let me take this opportunity also to thank everyone who has made this meeting possible, from the staff in my office, guest speakers, moderators, the interpreters, and all participants, thank you for your time and participation. As I end, I once again wish to reiterate my commitment to strengthen collaboration with Member States, Regional Economic Communities, Centres of Excellence, Women Organizations and the United Nations to scale up actions to ensure full delivery of the Women, Peace and Security Agenda in Africa. With these remarks, I now close the virtual meeting for the launch of the 2020 report on WPS. Thank you for your kind attention.
Challenge & Solution
Project Information
Client:
African Union Peace and Security
Location:
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Date:
23rd September, 2021