 everyone for coming and we apologize for the delay in getting started but we know that you're all excited to be here I'd like to welcome you to CSIS good afternoon my name is Janet Fleischman I'm a senior associate with the CSIS Global Health Policy Center it's our great pleasure and honor to have Dr. Dlamini Zuma here with us today as many of you know Dr. Dlamini Zuma is the chairperson of the African Union Commission since her election in July 2012 she is the first woman to lead the AU or its predecessor the OAU so it is particularly exciting that she is here to talk with us today about the issues of women the women's development and empowerment in Africa she has had a very impressive career as a medical student at the University of Natal in the 1970s she became an active underground member of the ANC and then the deputy president of the South African Students Organization she fled into exile in 1976 and completed her medical studies at the University of Bristol in the UK after the historic 1994 elections in South Africa Dr. Dlamini Zuma was appointed by President Nelson Mandela to be Minister of Health and then in 1999 by President Tabo and Becky to be Foreign Minister and then in 2009 she was appointed to be Minister of Home Affairs this has been a very important time under her tenure at during her tenure at the AU some of the most urgent issues that the world has been confronting have been taking place from the mobilization of more than 800 medical workers from across Africa to respond to the Ebola crisis to peacekeeping missions including in Somalia and Darfur to the new African Centers for Disease Response and Prevention the MOU of which was just signed today with Secretary John Kerry and then the excitement around the AU's plans for development for the next 50 years the agenda 2063 which I'm sure we'll hear more about today but especially noteworthy is the AU theme for 2015 which is women's empowerment and development this demonstrates that the chairperson has succeeded in putting women's empowerment at the forefront of Africa's political agenda recognizing that women's empowerment and development is not only critical for its own in its own right but it is essential for the development of the continent. Chairperson Lamini Zuma has often spoken of her desire to retire the hand hoe to the Museum of History and as she steps forward as a champion of women's empowerment and development we can see that she's also referring to retiring the discriminatory attitudes and abuses faced by millions of women and girls in Africa. These issues have never been more challenging or more important tomorrow marks one year since the abduction of the school girls in Nigeria starkly underscoring that the health education and empowerment of women and girls in Africa is essential for peace and development on the continent and that promoting gender equality and advancing the status of women and girls around the world remains one of the greatest unmet challenges of our time one that is vital to achieving the foreign policy objectives of the United States as well as of the African Union. So I present to you Dr. Lamini Zuma. Thank you very much and I'm so honored as deemed ladies and gentlemen to address this forum about an issue that is so critical for human development and for building a just world. Twenty years ago we meant from all over the world from all walks of life gathered in Beijing and adopted a platform of action to accelerate gender equality everywhere. This year we celebrate two decades of that event. Women across the world are taking stock of what has happened during that 20 years. There is no question that we have made some progress on women's rights as human rights, access to basic services women's legal position and rights and reproductive health and many other areas. But across the world also following Beijing women and progressive men have mobilized and organized amended constitutions and introduced laws in order to take the platform of action forward. We have pushed to increase women's representation in boardrooms, in parliament, in cabinets, professions, security forces, judiciary and management through advocacy. We have pushed quotas and legislation towards gender equality. A number of countries for the first time in history have women heads of state, prime ministers and Nigeria has just appointed the first woman governor. There is great awareness of girls and women's rights and protection against domestic and sexual violence as well as violence in conflicts. However, despite all these advances, the pace of change has been too slow. Globalization has seen greater inequality and feminization of poverty. As we all know, more than 70% of the poor are women. And although women make up half, more than half the population of the world, and maybe I may add and produce the other half, we are still less than a god of the world's legislative. Women's unpaid domestic work and community labor still remain unrecognized in accounts of GDPs and an equal pay for equal work is still painfully elusive in some countries. I don't know about here. The gender gap index estimates that if we continue on the same pace, it will take us at least 80 years to have equality. But I'm quite sure we all agree that we cannot wait for 80 years. So it means that we must accelerate the pace. Whilst we celebrate the achievements, but we must really focus our discussion on how we can speed up change. It is for this reason that Africa's own development aspirations have necessitated that we declare this year as the year of women's empowerment and development. And this was very important because we just adopted our agenda 2063, which is our 50-year framework for development for Africa. And we want to transform and integrate Africa so that in the shortest possible time we can have shared prosperity, we can have peace and have a people-centered Africa that plays its role in the world. And so we decided that we don't want 10, 20 years down the line to say, but what about women in this agenda? We wanted to ensure that women are part of this agenda from day one. And then key to this empowerment of women and girls, we're making sure that their rights are central in the implementation of agenda 2063, from education to health to participation in infrastructure development, in manufacturing, in mining. As we develop our blue and green economies, we must make sure that women are part of that. In addition, it's very important that women have access to energy and clean water. Now it may not make sense, too much sense to some of you, because you take those things for granted. But in Africa, many women still have to walk for long distances to get clean water, to get water not necessarily clean, and to look for fuel, firewood, so energy, access to energy and water are not just a developmental issue, but they are a very central gender issue because women, once they have access to these things, they are able to have time for more productive work. And of course, also access to sanitation and improving family health, freeze women so that they can have time to study or to get employment. And Africa, during this year, women is focusing on agriculture. And why agriculture? Because 70% of women in Africa are working in agriculture. So it's a very critical area if we're talking about women. And of course, as she has said, when we were gathering views in order to put Agenda 2063 together, the women farmers said to us, one of the things they want is that their home must be punished to the agricultural museum. It breaks their back. It makes them look 60 when they are 40. And it just adds very little productivity anyway, adds very little productivity. So they want better technology. They want land rights. They want access to capital and extension services, infrastructure, storage. So we have then decided that we have put this in Agenda 2063, but we have put it in the first 10 years of Agenda 2063. Because we think if concretely we can say in the next 10 years, no woman should be using a home so that after 10 years we can indeed put it in the museum. So we are looking at practical ways. What are the technologies? Things like small tillers and so on that we can help women. And also looking at irrigation so that they can, we can transform agriculture, make it more productive for them. But also what we found is that young people don't want to go to agriculture. But you can blame them. What young people is going to want to go and be using that home? But if you're using better technology, we might attract them into agriculture because it's not sustainable that we don't have young people in agriculture. So it's also going to help in that way. We're also emphasizing in Agenda 2063 that we must invest in our people in health, in education, of both boys and girls. And we must begin to shift the focus to science, technology, engineering and maths. Because those are the areas that are going to be important in economies going forward. And also in developing Africa, whether we're talking infrastructure, whether we're talking energy, we will need those skills. But we want to emphasize that those skills are not only for boys, but both boys and girls. We also feel that women and young people are going to be the real drivers of our development. And if we live out women, then I don't think we can achieve Agenda 2063. It's as simple as all that. We are also advocating that we must increase the number of women in parliaments and in cabinets. And that's very important because that's where laws are made. That's where policies that impact on them, on their children, on their families are made. So a critical mess of women is necessary. And we think 30% should be a start. Of course, we want to move to 50%. But I must say in Africa, only 14 countries have 30 or more percent of women in parliament. But proudly, the leader in the world is in Africa. Rwanda is leading the world with 63% of parliamentarians being women. So we think it can be done. If Rwanda can get up to 63%, 63.8%. Why can't others get to 30% as a start? So it has to be done. Women and children suffer the most when there is instability or war. And therefore, it's very important for us to also look at peace and stability and security on the continent. And of course, we know that if there is war, the girls lose their schooling. As we have seen, some of them have lost their childhood. They've been taken. We don't know what's happening to them. And of course, women lose their Amiga assets that they have. And they suffer the sexual violence. And so peace and security is very important for the well-being of women and girls. And for women's continued empowerment. But they must also be there when peace is negotiated. They must be part of prevention, conflict prevention. And I think we also want to raise the issue of human trafficking because it tends to be, again, women and children tend to be the most that are trafficked. And I don't even know why we call it human trafficking because it's just slavery all over again as far as I'm concerned. It's just modern day slavery and we need to fight and really stop it. And we need to work all across the world. And so in our view, empowering women actually means that more development, accelerated development, social and cultural development, empowerment to families and communities. It makes social and economic sense to have women. And I think if we empower women, men will also benefit, families will benefit. And there probably will be more peace and more equity in the world. And indeed a better world will be created. So the more women I empower, the better the world will be. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you so much for those remarks. This is a wonderful opportunity for us to delve a little deeper into some of the issues that this presents for the African Union, for the member states and for women and girls and men and boys across the continent. So maybe to begin, since you spoke about the agenda 2063 and this theme for this year about women's empowerment and development, can you tell us in practical terms, what does that mean for the AU itself and for its member states? It meant the year for women and the empowerment of women in general. Well, for the AU it means that our policies must clearly be, our policies must clearly be very gender sensitive. We must ensure that in everything we do, let me just use an example. Africa has neglected its blue economy. We have three times the oceanic spaces as we have land space, but we have not really benefited from that. So we are, we have decided that one of the things we must do within Agenda 2063 is to develop our blue economy, explore our oceanic spaces and what we have encouraged women right from the beginning to be part of that. About a month ago, or even less, there was a first meeting of women and the blue economy hosted by Angola because we don't want them to be left out, we want them to be part of the initial discussions. Secondly, we have started a campaign about the handheld home. So we are looking at replacing it, particularly with tillers, which are manageable for small farmers. And we think that, and they are not that expensive compared to tractors, where appropriate tractors, but on the whole we are looking at tillers and we have started this campaign and we have, we want our member states to buy them. We also are raising funds for them so that because Agenda 2063 is, we want it to be practical. We, in June this, this year at our summit, were going to be discussing this theme of women's empowerment, but we are going to bring an agenda index and we are going to read out who in various areas in business, in women in the economy, women in civil service, in the civil service, in many areas and we are going to look at how each country is doing and this index will be updated every year so that we are able to praise those who are doing well and maybe encourage those who are not doing so well to be like the others who may be doing well. So in a practical sense we want to, we want to do that. We are also, so that will also assist us to look at if we're talking maternal mortality. These countries are doing well. What is it that they are doing better than the others so that we can share experience. If we are looking at women in decision-making, what is it that Rwanda and the other 14 countries have done better and how have they managed it? Have they used quotas? What have they used? For instance, we were in, I was in Namibia not so long ago on the 21st of March and Namibia had taken a decision to have Swapo and the ruling party to have 50-50 in their list but they had not quite gotten to implementing it but the president before he left he decided it has to be implemented and people were saying but how are you going to get this 50-50. But he came with a very simple plan that worked. He said okay when, because they have proportional representation so he said okay when we elect people who will go to parliament will elect from two lists instead of one. One list will be women, the other list will be men and we'll get 42 from each side and that's it. And that's what they did and suddenly they realized it's not so difficult. So I'm just saying we're looking at real practical things in each area of what to do to advance in education particularly young women who are encouraging them to get into science and technology. So they are practical things that we are doing. For member states the way we we've gone about agenda 2063 we started by consulting with ordinary citizens and then we the first draft came from ideas of ordinary citizens and that's the draft that we then gave to governments but now what the governments are going to be doing is to look at their own plans and make sure that they are in line with agenda 2063 because that's the only way it can really be implemented. It should not be seen as a document that is sitting on its on one side and countries are going the other way. So each country and some countries have already asked if we can assist to make sure that they put it in their national plans. So those are some of the practical things that we are doing. You talked about the practical things that can be done but there are also things that will be requiring resources and I wonder if there'll be resources available from the AU itself from the member states even from development partners or private sector that might get involved in supporting any of these efforts. Yes one of the things that we have been working on and in January was adopted was how to look at domestic resource mobilization first for the AU because up to now a lot of the funds for the AU have been coming from outside. We are not saying that those funds shouldn't come from outside but we're saying more should be mobilized from inside. So we're looking at alternate sources of funding so that countries can get more resources besides what they have from their fiscal. So a whole range of areas were looked at and there was there was an agreement that for instance all our operational costs should be borne by member states. Programs 75% should be borne by us and peace and security 25% should be Africans. 25% for peace and security because really peace and security is the responsibility of the security council but we do want to have some resources so that we can act quickly because we know that the security council takes long and sometimes they say there is no peace to keep so they can't come. For instance if I were to use an example of Central African Republic, 2013 December the world was saying there's going to be genocide in Central African Republic but the security council didn't come. It was the AU that puts a force together to go and stabilize the situation and then 2014 September 15th the security council said yeah now there's peace we can come so they came and took over because there was peace to keep so now we want to have this 25% of our budget for peace and security so that we can move quickly because it's our people who die if the conflict rages on and we are very proud that in Africa even though we have conflict but none of them are raging on like the conflicts we see in other parts because we tend to work together to try and at least control it not to go get out of hand and then once we negotiate and do that but we try and make sure that not so many people continue to die for years than years as we have seen elsewhere so we are looking at all that we are also looking at kebbing the illicit flows of resources that leave the continent there was a study done that showed that 50 billion US dollars every year leave the continent but what was interesting was that 60% of that is corporate 32% is organized crime and 88% is corruption within so though we were all chasing corruption which we should still chase but it's only 8% the 60% is from corporate and we now have to work and then show that over time we are able to stamp that outflow Maybe you could take a moment to talk but also I mean we will continue getting resources from outside for those who want to assist and we also of course the private sector and so on but we also want to to have a bit of control over our destiny. Could you take a moment to tell us a little bit of your own experience that brought you to be so passionate about these issues of women's development women's empowerment in Africa? I think if you are passionate about human beings you cannot be passionate about issues of women because issues of women impact on children they impact on families but I think it was within the African National Congress which is the part the political party that I belong to it's not a political party it's a movement it was the movement that fought for freedom and I they had a section that dealt with women the women's league so I think as a young woman I saw and I had a lot of interest in what they were doing because I was a woman and all the things they were talking about were things that I was experiencing as a woman so I would say it was within the ANC that I really got passionate about women's issues and they gave us space to be passionate about it. Maybe you could speak I know there's lots of questions in the audience and I have plenty of questions I wish I had time to ask but maybe you could speak about some of the big challenges to moving this agenda forward and the risks for Africa if this agenda is not implemented. Well the challenges are many and of course the first challenge is really the resources and as I say we are trying our best to deal with them the second one is human resources because if we don't develop our own capacity to implement then who is going to implement so that's the second challenge and it's a risk but it's something that we have prioritized that the skilling of our young people is going to be critical of course we are hoping also that some of the skilled people of African descent and the diaspora can also come and help but that's a big challenge that we're looking at already we have a team that's looking at what capacities are going to be necessary so that and we are beginning to look at how we can increase those capacities including using technology and so on. Of course the third risk is also a piece and of course the issue of terrorism that we see it's a it's a big challenge and the risk but as I say we are trying our best to do something about it but we also know that our population is the youngest in the world we are a young continent and we are going to continue being a young continent into 2050 we are going to still be the youngest continent and so it means we have plenty of the precious resource that is needed if we invest in it that would be how we can get the agenda forward but the big risk if we don't the young people are not going to sit and starve or look at the rest of the world developing they are going to actually be reckless and so it's it's very important that we we do achieve the agenda 2063 for so that indeed our people especially the young people can have a jobs can create jobs can be innovative can develop to their full potential and of course if we don't achieve agenda 2063 it means we won't have enough food to feed ourselves and that's a big risk so I don't think we have their choice but to achieve it and empowering it and empower women obviously they are going to be there more than 50% of the population so if we don't empower them it means we'll be working at half capacity so critical for the development and the future of Africa well let's take a few questions I'm gonna ask that you take maybe three at a time I'm gonna ask that you identify yourself and ask one question and then we'll be coming around with the microphone so you can identify yourself so let's start let's start over here with the first one thank you very much my name is Sophia Paul from South Sudan I'm very pleased to to be part of this symposium you know what has happened in my country you have talked about peace and security as a topic I'm a survivor and I witnessed of what has happened in my country I took to upon myself to really advocate and work very hard for peace to be a reality in my country as a woman and as an icon in African continent and a leader we have been looking at you as a motivating factor for us women from Africa of late there was a report a leak report about the root causes of the conflict somehow that report seems not to be the right one we the victims we want to know what has happened in my country thank you very much now we're gonna go to the other side over here hi my name is Jackie O'Neill and the director of the Institute for Inclusive Security and we focus on women's inclusion and peace negotiations around the world so I want to thank you for elevating this topic and speaking about it here in DC and at CSIS you were the first head of the African Union to appoint a special envoy for women peace and security I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about where women peace and security fits in agenda 2063 I learned just this morning that I think the 50th country in the world to develop a national action plan is Mali and I'm wondering if in your experience national action plans on women peace and security are important for member states to have and if you've noticed any difference in the conduct of countries that have them versus some that don't thank you and we'll take one more question and then we'll give madam chairperson a chance to respond over here hello my name is Carolyn Tackett thank you so much for joining us today and with the public international on policy group I just sort of on the same note as these first two questions I'd like to ask what do you see as sort of the best practices and maybe opportunities for the African Union and other members of the international community to support women on the ground who are actively trying to involve themselves in these peace negotiations and conflict prevention processes what now how can how can we support those women who are taking on those initiatives thank you okay so three questions related to peace and security okay starting with South Sudan we commissioned any inquiry and led by former president of Assange and he and his team and in the team we included our special envoy on gender and women in conflict but we also included other women the report was completed and was given to us as the commission we had been asked by peace and security to to commission this so we gave back the report to them at the summit in January and at the time as you may know the two parties that been meeting in Arusha trying to reunite and they had reached certain agreements and now they were taking those agreements into the peace negotiations and at the time it looked to the negotiators as though they are just about to clinch a deal and so the chair of EGAT felt that and supported by others that the report must come after they've just finished that part of negotiations and so the report is there the peace and security will discuss it probably definitely in July they may discuss it even in June at the summit but they may discuss it even earlier but it's ready it's there and none of us want impunity so yes negotiations yes reconciliation but also accountability and then the the special envoy and the role of women I think women are very important maybe I'll just talk about my own experience when in the 90s there was a lot of violence in South Africa political violence especially in the province where I come from in Guazubuna town and at a point in time women we decided as women from both parties to come together and to say for us this is enough from both sides and I think those discussions between the IFP women and the ANC and them pushing their sides to stop the violence to come to an agreement I think it assisted a lot because once the IFP women themselves felt that they want peace they don't want any more of this violence we were able to work with them because sometimes we forget as women that there is a lot in common amongst us besides that we are in different political parties but there's a lot that we can do together as women irrespective from any other any party but even when the Constitution was being drawn we came together and formed women's coalition from different parties from civil society from religious and said these are the things as women that we want in the Constitution irrespective of where we come from so I think the role of women sometimes is underestimated and we ourselves underestimate the role we can play and I think and that's why we felt that it's important to have a special envoy that's looking specifically because she's able to go and meet women and women are able to tell her things sometimes that they are unable to tell to men and she's able to organize them and share experiences with them and bring some from different countries and so on so we think that it's a very important and of course action plans are important as long as women are the integral part of drawing them and as long as they are implemented and of course there is a lot of things we can you can do to help the women on the ground first just sharing experience with them discussing with them also giving them some resources usually it's not even a lot that they need to organize themselves and so I think there is a lot that can be done and those who are in conflict some of them have even lost all their possession so small things can also assist them and the children to go to school so there's a whole range of things that can be done from starting from just sharing experience to having workshops with them or just discussions with them to assisting them concretely and and also it's important for women even post-conflict to be able to get engaged in income generating activities and businesses even if they are small to start with not that they should be small forever because also economic some degree of economic independence is very important to to the women in these situations why don't we take another round of questions maybe we'll hear from some of the men this time thank you very much madam Sherman my name is Garang being a quote ambassador of the Republic of South Sudan madam share person let me congratulate you again for gaining the country the confidence of the continent being appointed as the share person of AU I know how difficult it was because I was there as part of the delegation of the Republic of South Sudan and how many rounds did you compete with the man to beat him at last so I'm happy for you I have a question and a comment the first question the question is that you talk about the empowerment women in the area of agriculture and we know that in Africa and elsewhere there's the issue of access to land for women how do you address this issue with our embedded traditions that men are the owners of the land so access to the land women the comment I want to make is to regard of what my sister Sophia said there I think when I came here didn't expect that this is going to be a campaign for the rebels and the government and I know sister Sophia she was a member of parliament and I was a member of parliament this current parliament appointed by the president to be a member of the parliament and she should be appreciative to the president that appointed her to be a member of parliament and her city still there vacant I was elected member of parliament and then given this assignment to come and say I don't think that she's a survivor because she left from Juba Airport with her child in her hand boarded a plane to Nairobi if the government wanted to kill her the government could have snatched her from the airport and kill her how can you say that you are a survivor when you left through the past through the airport so stop telling lies I just want to respond to the thank you excellency thank you very much I was going to bring up my name is Nia I was actually coming with a young graduate student born in Africa who's here but the schedule changed so she asked me to ask a question that are you going to be the Mrs Clinton of South Africa and set an example for them I think I think in the interest of time because we started late and I I fear that we're gonna have to wrap up fairly soon maybe I'll let you answer those two questions and then we'll see maybe someone can tell us if we have an extra time for another round why don't we just take all of them and I answer do we all right another round all right let's do one from the youth hello my name is Simon Adegi I want to represent is the button I want to really address the situation of the fact that the African Union is not aware of a shift in popular culture especially with the African youth and as regards to agriculture I've been to 21 African countries in the research work having to work with young Africans and majority are interested in agriculture and having to speak about the part that the ambassador mentioned with land we know that the African culture that majority of the land belong to a family or ends up being to their head of the family or the son and women tend to not have the opportunity to have anything to do with that what policy is the African Union creating for land accessible for women just like in Poland and in the UK they have provision for people interested in agriculture not only for the rich because it seems like agriculture is now for the rich and the grants are being handed over to the wealthy so what exactly is the African Union doing as regards to that and also would like to see a situation where as regards to shifting cultural popular culture for the African Union to play more with technology social media and music and which are the real big factors of a winners especially in Africa thank you okay we'll take one last question and then we'll allow madam chairperson to wrap up good afternoon ladies and gentlemen my name is Rosemary Segero thank you madam chair for coming again it was nice seeing you at the African summit you and your wonderful speech at the African summit my executive summary to the president Obama at the African summit was peace and security agriculture and women empowerment women cannot be empowered when we have conflicts violence and people who suffer more are women and young girls when they are abused how do we empower them to what we want to 20 60 or even 10 years how do we empower them when they are being abused especially in TRC Congo where now young people are being children are being sexually assaulted this is what you need to boot because we believe in you we value you and with your leadership you have really empowered us and more information madam chair lady is here how do we partner with you this is my letter to you as a civil society I was born and raised in Kenya in the rural area we need to get the women in the rural area people in the rural area communities in the rural area be empowered we want to partner with you this is my letter I'll give you today when you leave it all the time we take pictures but this time is a letter I'm gonna use the prerogative of the chair to ask one last question that you can add in because you were the minister of health you are a medical doctor and the issues of women's health both maternal mortality which you alluded to but also access to family planning access to information and services maybe in your final comments you can address the interest of the African Union and the importance of the member states to move forward in that area as well okay thank you very much access to land yes it's true that land in Africa it's very difficult in terms of traditional ways and we may intend not to have access to land but as I said earlier that we are going to have this index and there are countries which have put legislation that gives women rights to land I will just in the interest of time I'll just quote one Ethiopia where I live now as the chair has got a lot now where both men and women have access to land if the land belongs to the men it also belongs to his wife and if they divorce or separate for whatever reason they have to take half the land and and also if the men dies the land remains with the woman whereas in the past the land only belong to the men if he decided it doesn't want this woman anymore the woman is out of the land and other women comes and if he dies the family uncle or somebody takes over the land so there they have a law that now gives women the rights to land and so in this index would be specifying which countries have done what and asking them to share with the others how they've gone about it so that they the others can also do the same so we are aware of that but it's not it's not all not is lost because there are countries that have put laws in place and we will be encouraging the others and of course we are also going to be meeting with financial institutions because it's also very well to have land but if you have no access to finance and you are already discussing with private sector but we are going to be discussing specifically with financial institutions because both for women and youth they they have difficulties in accessing finance for their businesses or for agriculture and so we hope that that will also encourage young people because they say once they see their age and their looks the bankers just say I know you don't need to young you don't have experience so we want to address that social media yes we do use social media in in the EU of course we can use it more and we do try and follow the trends we also got young people who are at the EU some of them are working but some of them are intense so it's not an organization of old people and then on the question of women women being abused of course that's why we even have this envoy special envoy and who are working hard we are talking we are advocating so we can partner with you we have no problem because it's our view that we need to advocate and to get women not to be suffering from abuse but to be doing productive work for themselves and for their families and children and so we will take the letter happily and see what what's in it and women's health yes in fact we fought very hard to get women's health as part of Beijing but also the WSW well sustainable development conference and in the EU our protocols are also very much into women's health now it's a matter of implementation and well there are lots of countries actually that have put programs of family planning of reproductive rights and so on so we are making progress there but we would like to make faster progress well maybe in the in the in South Africa it's likely different from here here you can just stand and declare yourself a candidate in South Africa it's a bit different I'll talk about the ruling party because that's the one I know best in the ruling party you don't just declare yourself it's the branches of the ruling party that say we nominating this one and then it goes up until the national and if it's national you you go through then so I can't answer that question because I'm not the one who has to declare any final thoughts closing remarks well it's just to to say that I just hope that it's not only and the letter that I will get that for cooperation but we need to would like to network and to with women here and in Africa and so we we hope that indeed we can link and and have networks we have as the commissioner for trades maybe you should stand in the EU that's our commissioner for trade and industry we are ten commissioners five for women five for men and we're trying to get there the the officials also are trying to get more and more women so that it is indeed balanced and reflects the demography of the content well we thank you so much for sharing your insights and your time with us we look forward to continuing the the work to work together and to see what you will be accomplishing in the years ahead and that we can work together on these issues of women's empowerment and development in Africa so please join me in thanking