Crown the Woman (CREW), South Sudan
Crown the Woman (CREW) is an NGO that empowers girls and women to recognize their own potential and contribute to nation building in economic, social and political terms. CREW works towards the realization of gender equality, women’s rights, women’s security, and provision of the most basic needs such as accessible medical care.
CREW offers seminars, workshops, focus group discussions, radio and television programs on women’s rights, capacity building trainings, and psychosocial support to heal and comfort women affected by various forms of trauma. They also feature South Sudanese women leaders on radio, television, and their social media platforms to shed light on women who have been involved in efforts to bring about change in South Sudan.
Institute for Young Women’s Development, Zimbabwe
The Institute for Young Women’s Development (IYWD) works to empower girls and women to challenge and dismantle oppressive systems in Zimbabwe and does so by mobilizing girls and women from mining and rural communities. Since being founded in 2009, IYWD has mobilized over 3000 young women and girls between the ages of 15 to 35 in Mashonaland Central Province. These young women and girls are now conscious of and confident in exercising political responsibilities to resist, disrupt and defend their voice and power in decision-making in their families, communities and electoral politics.
IYWD’s projects include increasing women’s participation in and access to decision making processes, promoting participatory and gender inclusive local governance for improved gender responsive social service delivery, and using organic fish farming to strengthen young women’s voices. Some of the more recent achievements of IYWD include providing solidarity and support mechanisms to young women in leadership as well those aspiring to participate in the 2018 elections as candidates, election agents, observers and campaigner, conducting surveys on young women’s political participation, and facilitating the establishment of 10 community Peace Committee Working Groups which are playing an active role in mobilizing and advocating for young women’s participation in national and local decision-making processes.
Hope for the Needy Association, Cameroon
Hope for the Needy Association (HOFNA) was founded in 2007 to strengthen the leadership, power, and voices of women and girls from disadvantaged communities. Since their founding, HOFNA has successfully contributed towards helping girls and young women become self-reliant, socially conscious and confident leaders, who are equipped with the necessary skills and knowledge to create positive social change in their communities.
HOFNA initiated the Enhancing Multicultural Dialogue for Peace project in 2015, which engaged over 150 youth and civil society leaders from all ten regions of Cameroon, in their first ever National Forum on Youth, Women, Peace, and Security. HOFNA has also conducted two national spoken word and poetry contests on peace involving more than 5,000 youth in Cameroon via social media. Since participating in the 2019 Peace and Social Change Fellowship program, HOFNA has launched the Women4Women Initiative, which has engaged over 500 women and girls across Cameroon in peace building training.
Coast Women in Development, Kenya
Coast Women in Development (CWID) is a nonprofit organization that contributes to the protection of human rights through lobbying and advocacy, working on issues such as sexual and reproductive health, women and youth empowerment, sexual and gender-based violence in coastal communities in Kenya and the Horn of Africa. CWID was founded in 2005 with the goal of expanding women’s roles in governance, sustainable development, leadership, and education. At the community level, CWID works towards capacity-building and increased awareness through educational outreach via campaigns and trainings on health, peace and security matters.
CWID is a key player in several coalitions such as Kenya AIDS NGO Consortium, Women’s Alliances of Kenya, Mombasa County Health Advocacy Network, Coast Civil Society Reference Group for Security and Human Rights, and the Pwani Gender-Based Violence Network.
Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Ghana
In 2011, Ghana joined the Women’s International League for Peace & Freedom (WILPF) and became an official section of WILPF in 2015. WILPF Ghana works to dismantle uneven power relations based on gender both within families and society at large, to challenge and decrease militarism, and to promote human rights both regionally and nationally. WILPF-Ghana prioritizes peace education addressing underlying causes of violence and has partnered with various local organizations and other sections of WILPF in Africa to work towards these goals.
Currently, WILPF-Ghana is developing a plan for advocacy at the national level on completely banning fully autonomous weapons and educating the Ghanaian government about the need to actively respond to challenges raised by the development of weapons systems that would select and attack targets without any human control. Thanks to WILPF, Ghana is now one of 26 countries demanding a new treaty to preemptively ban killer robots.