This week Ghana held a three-day workshop for journalists to tackle women's rights in the country. The workshop aimed to enhance an understanding of women's issues for reporters working in online media and radio. The training, which was organized by the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), was the second phase of a project to expand public education on women's rights and brought together 24 selected journalists from 12 radio stations in the Northern, Central and Western regions of the country. It saw participants develop radio programs, documentaries and positive reportage aimed at promoting the rights of women and children in the country. Sheila Minkah-Premo, Co-Director, Leadership and Advocacy for Women in Africa (LAWA) Ghana, said in press statements that the organization had used “various legal strategies including undertaking legal research on various issues of concern to women and made recommendations for law reforms.” She continued: “We have also drafted some laws for the consideration of law makers and made proposals for the enactment of policies to protect women's human rights.” Minkah-Premo stated that LAWA had also used test case litigation to promote the rights of women and undertaken sensitization on various laws in Ghana. She added that legal literacy programs to educate people, “particularly illiterate women, on their legal rights and network with like-minded organizations and coalitions to tackle women's rights issues” were key to the workshop. She mentioned some major accomplishments as the Domestic Violence Act passed in 2007 and noticing the inequity that woman suffered at the end of marriages, the organization researched into and drafted proposals for legislation on the equitable distribution of marital property at divorce. BM
