Women advised to vote for female Parliamentary candidates

Adanwomase (Ash), Nov. 17, GNA - Ghanaian women have been advised to resolve to cast their votes for Female Parliamentary Candidates in the upcoming Election 2004 to help to augment their numbers in Parliament.

Madam Agnes Donkor, Convention People's Party (CPP) Parliamentary Candidate for the Kwabre East Constituency, who gave the advice, said it was only by having a fair representation of women in Parliament that issues relating to women could be well articulated and their concerns genuinely addressed.

Madam Donkor was speaking at a forum organised by the Youth Network for Human Rights and Democracy, a nongovernmental organisation (NGO) at Adanwomase on Tuesday for aspiring Parliamentary Candidates in the Kwabre East Constituency to enable them to interact with the constituents and explain their programmes to them.

There are three Parliamentary candidates contesting the seat - Madam Donkor of the CPP, Mr Kofi Frimpong of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and Mr Augustine Domfe of the National Democratic Congress (NDC). Mr Domfe did not attend.

Madam Donkor said because women had little representation in Parliament, issues regarding their welfare had often been relegated to the background and not given the needed attention.

She pledged to liaise and explore avenues to have clinics established in the various communities to make health care more accessible to the constituents should she be elected. Outlining his programme, Mr Frimpong said his priority would be the improvement of the standard of education at all levels, since education was the "pillar upon which development of all facets of life could be built".

To achieve this, he said he would work in close collaboration with all stakeholders to provide incentive packages to motivate teachers to give of their best.

Mr Emmanuel Ani Boye, Kwabre District Director of the National Commission for Civic Education, who presided, entreated constituents to appreciate the prime role of parliamentarians as legislators, and desist from blaming them for the under development of their areas. "Even though they could lobby for projects to their areas, they are not directly responsible for the execution of projects but rather for enacting laws that could facilitate the progress of the constituency and the nation", he stressed.