African women brainstorm at a Cairo meeting, writes Inas Mazhar To promote and develop African women in sports, 80 African women met in Cairo for the first seminar for women and sport in Africa. The four-day seminar was organised by the African National Olympic Committees Association (ANOCA) and supervised by the International Olympic Committee's Women and Sport Commission. "I'm glad to see all these women from all over the continent so keen to attend this forum, the English and French speaking countries. It was magnificent and I'm sure they have learned a lot from all the training they have been receiving the past few days," said Anita de La Frantz, the IOC chairwoman of the commission. "I hope they'll now return back home to their countries with new ideas but what's more important was to implement them in their countries," De La Frantz added. During the seminar participants were trained on sports project management and techniques of presentation, negotiations and issues on leadership. At the end, the seminar came up with 12 recommendations which include inviting the African National Committees (NOCs) to consider the issue of gender equality in all their programmes and policies and to recognise the specific needs of women in order to enable them to play a more important role in African sport. It recommended that all women involved in African sport have equal opportunities in their personal and professional development (athletes, coaches and administrators) and also recommended that women and sport commissions be created in all NOCs of Africa. The recommendations also urge ANOCA to include more women in its commissions; call upon ANOCA to encourage and harmonise the dates of annual seminars on women and sport of the seven zone associations; encourage the African NOCs to generally use Olympic solidarity programmes and contribute to the creation of a museum on sport in Africa a women's section. "I was so impressed to see that there is an Olympic museum at the Egyptian National Olympic Committee," said Nawal Al-Moutawakel, president of the women and sport commission at ANOCA. "It's magnificent and I believe it's one of a kind in Africa and I think all African countries should start thinking of having their own museums." According to Al-Moutawakel, who is also a member of the same commission at the IOC, the recommendations suggest the creation and or the strengthening of an African network of women in sport; asks ANOCA to organise training sessions for women on subjects such as coaching, technical activities, administration or media; and proposes the establishment of an ANOCA "women and sport" trophy that will be awarded yearly in recognition of outstanding activities and progress achieved to develop, encourage and strengthen the participation of women and young girls at all levels of sport in Africa. It also requests ANOCA to dedicate one page of its website to the participation of women and sport in Africa and proposes to amend the ANOCA charter to include a clause about gender. Al-Moutawakel described the recommendations as dreams. "We have the right to dream but we'll be working on making them come true. We have many expectations and we will follow up with all national associations to make sure of implementing these recommendations because this wasn't a hello and good-bye seminar." The participants who represented 51 NOCs agreed that the seminar was useful. "I think it was a useful seminar. These women have really learned new skills that can be applied back home," said Egypt's Rania Elwani, former champion swimmer and a current member of the IOC athletes' commission. Chairperson of the Zimbabwean women and sport commission Nhokwara Serkesai said the seminar had taken serious and practical steps towards the development of women in sports. "We have learned how to make presentations and how to negotiate. I believe this seminar has helped develop our characters. Women are now at the negotiating table and I believe that our people back home will be surprised by how much we have changed in just four days. It's a complete transformation." Chairwoman of the South Africa women and sport commission Sylvia Dale said this was the best seminar she has attended in terms of topics, projects and technicalities. "We really gained a lot specially learning negotiating skills and management," Dale said, adding that it was a good opportunity to meet with African women, become exposed to cultural differences and learn from various experiences. The ANOCA women and sport commission is comprised of 15 women. According to Al-Moutawakel, "the commission's mission is to promote an effective participation of women in sport in Africa at all levels; technical, administrative and decision making structures." She said the first seminar for African women was held to help develop more initiatives to increase the presence of African women in sport at practical and management levels. "There were other reasons for organising this seminar -- encouraging the organisation of training programmes for women in different domains of sport (leadership, management, coaching, refereeing, journalism), highlighting women who have worked and contributed to the development of physical education and sport in Africa at all levels, ensuring a more equal representation of women in decision making and administrative structures of NOCs and undertaking studies and research on the subject of women in sport in Africa. "Our action plan for the future is based on making a study on women's participation in structures of African sport, including more women in all ANOCA commissions in technical, medical, and media fields; amending ANOCA statutes to include a clause on women's representation; developing an information manual on the promotion of women in sport in Africa; enabling women to benefit from training in leadership, management, coaching, journalism, and ensuring that women candidatures be considered for the ANOCA "Olympic Initiative prize". The plan also aims at ensuring that women, whether sportswomen, leaders or trainers are awarded for promoting Olympic values among youth, and developing communication on women and sport websites and bulletins. "I will really hate it if all these women cannot communicate until the next seminar. This will mean a failure," Al-Moutawakel said. ANOCA has divided Africa into seven zones organising meetings and forums "and ensuring their harmonisation and to maximise the number of African women participating at the IOC World Women and Sport Conference in 2008," Al-Moutawakel said.
