Mon Women Fight for their Rights

Mon Women Fight for their Rights
by -
IMNA

Mon Women at the Mon Women’s Conference (MNC) proposed an eight-point plan to improve women’s rights and get them more involved in leadership and decision-making.

Mi Cherry Soe the chairwoman of the MWC’s organizing committee said: “When it comes to politics and peace talks there are very few women involved. Despite us as a group having demanded the right [to be more involved] in the past nothing has happened, so at this conference Mon women yet again called for the right [to be more involved].”

The eight-point plan, released at the end of the MWC proposed the following:

  1. The establishment of a Mon Women’s Network.
  2. The establishment of quotas for the number of women in political parties and other organisations.
  3. The inclusion of women in the upcoming Mon National Convention (MNC) with women making up at least one third of the MNC Working Committee members.
  4. Ensure that at least 30 percent of the participants in political and peace talks are women.
  5. Ensure that people in authority take action in an unbiased way against those who have committed offences against women or repressed them.
  6. Action to be taken against the widespread use of drugs in the region.
  7. The prevention or cessation of human rights abuses, particularly abuses against women and children and the restoration of those rights.
  8. The teaching of native ethnic languages at government primary schools with the government employing teachers to teach those languages.

Until these points are put into effect the conference delegates unanimously agreed that women should be allowed to be involved in politics and decision-making.