The Minister of Women Empowerment and the Family tackled Senators’ worries on burning issues yesterday, July 8, 2015.

The Minister of Women Empowerment and the Family, Professor Marie Thérèse Abena Ondoa, has condemned the practice whereby Cameroonian women are lured into job opportunities in foreign countries only to find themselves in slavery. “We have followed declarations by returning female slave workers over the media. Measures will be taken to stop the phenomenon,” Prof. Abena Ondoa assured concerned Senators yesterday who wanted to know government’s measures to assist hundreds of women reportedly working as slaves in the Middle East.

The Women Empowerment Minister who was at the Senate on July 8, 2015 to present deliberations of the 59th session of the United Nations Committee on the Condition of the Woman that held from 9 to 20 March, 2015 in New York, United States of America, received a question on the matter from Senator Claude Kemayou. Minister Abena Ondoa however used the opportunity to advise parents to stop indebting themselves to sponsor these journeys undertaken by their daughters for greener pastures. “Children should also know that they can have everything back here in Cameroon,” she stated.

During the restitution workshop chaired by Senate Vice President, Jean Takougang, other matters emerging from the Senators’ questions concerned the challenges faced when putting female candidates during local elections, the need for a concrete objective buried in a slogan to help parliamentarians support increase women empowerment budgetary allocations, early marriages and the need for families to promote culture, amongst others.

Among her several responses, Minister Abena Ondoa invited men to be involved in the promotion of gender and women empowerment while emphasising that building awareness against child discrimination starts in the family. She concluded with hopes that the Persons and Family Code draft forwarded by the Prime Minister’s Office to the Ministry of Justice will solve several problems raised by the Senators.