Celebrating women and stepping up efforts to gender equality

As August came to an end, God’s Love Ministries International, a Boksburg-based church, wrapped up Women’s Month celebrations with a colourful gala day to celebrate women and encourage women to be actively involved in the struggle to achieve gender equality.

The event, dubbed Women’s Fellowship, was held at the Birchwood Hotel on August 27.
It was attended by dozens of women from all walks of life and several guest speakers from various sectors, including International JNR Miss South Africa Mathabo Matlou, Boksburg North SAPS Social Crime Prevention Unit’s Sergeant Phina Matwetja, social worker Sarah Ndlovu and Pastor Mamma Matlou.

Pastor Matlou said the annual Women’s Fellowship initiative is aimed at empowering, creating a women’s network to share skills and encouraging victims of GBV and women marginalisation to speak up.
“This is about bringing women together, building families and providing a suitable platform for women to be able to offload their problems and worries onto someone.
“GBV affects all sectors of society. It knows no colour, religion or social or economic boundaries. So this initiative created a platform for our ladies to come forward and talk about their problems,” said Matlou.

Meanwhile, International JNR Miss South Africa Mathabo Matlou encouraged women to believe in themselves and stand together against women’s marginalisation.
“Most of us can agree that being a woman is difficult and is a task on its own, from having to please society and to become confident even if you are constantly brought down and mistreated.
“There are people out there that can crush your confidence; so it’s very important to believe in yourself without the influence of others,” said Mathabo.

Mathabo pointed out that abuse is not just a physical act, there is verbal abuse.
“The people that constantly bring you down with their words are verbally abusing you. Proverbs 15:4 says kind words heal and help while cutting words wound and maim.
“You need to be your number one priority and defend yourself at all times. You need to speak up to the people who always define who you are and show them you are not afraid to protect yourself and who you are.”

Mathabo urged women to stop making excuses for the people who make them feel less important or not good enough.
“Avoid the people that have nothing good to say about you because those are the same people that cause your depression and still carry on with their lives.
“Every one of us loves compliments and acknowledgements, but it’s something else when you depend on other people to make you feel good. You need to be your number one support system; you need to be the reason why you believe that you are beautiful.

“As women, we fight against marginalisation daily from the classroom to your workplace and many other environments that we place ourselves in. When we stand up against women’s marginalisation, some men see this as a man versus women fight.”

Mathabo said her vision is to see all women fight to be equal to men and be treated equally to men by the world. “As women, we are being told that we are weaker than men, we are told that we should respect men, but when are men going to be taught and expected to respect women?

“I want to live in a world where women and men are treated equally and it’s normal for a woman to be stronger than a man. I want to live in a world where it is normal for a woman to have a higher position than a man in the workplace without the man being called weak and not man enough.”

She, however, pointed out that although women are fighting for equality, they must always remember to treat men with kindness and still respect them because they are human.
“We are not fighting against men, what we are fighting for is for men to also respect us and treat us with kindness.
“We need to live in a world where we come together as men and women and strive towards a common goal and that goal is equality among each other.”

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