Chairperson, hon leaders of government, different Ministers, hon leaders of parties present here, comrades, ladies and gentlemen, as we mark this year's International Women's Day, the year 2010 marks the 100th anniversary of the establishment of International Women's Day in 1910.
The celebration this year coincides with the high-level 54th session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women currently being held at the UN headquarters in New York. This year our delegation from South Africa is being led by the Minister of Women, Children and People with Disabilities, Minister Mayende-Sibiya. It marks the 15th anniversary of the Beijing World Conference on Women and we are left with only five years to the target date of achieving our Millennium Development Goals.
We are pleased that this joint debate has been arranged to mark this very important day to give South Africans across the political spectrum the space to reflect on the challenges facing us in relation to the unequal position of women in South African society.
As South African women, we will also be celebrating the hosting of the 2010 World Cup. This gives an opportunity to showcase our enormous achievements, yet we must also use this opportunity to reflect on the gaps that exist between the achievements and the persistent inequalities in our country that fundamentally affect the poor and, in particular, women.
As women from the ruling party, we want to join the global community, particularly the women of the world, in commemorating this year's International Women's Day. The theme for this year, which is "Equal Rights, Equal Opportunities: Progress for All", will focus on the unfinished agenda of advancing the rights of women and ensuring that women have equal opportunities in all facets of life.
The theme accords the global community and our nation the opportunity to reaffirm a crucial commitment to equality, freedom and the advancement of women.
It was in 1910 that the women of the world began to use this day to reflect on the challenges facing them, on what they needed to do, and on strategies on how to confront these challenges. For instance, women in Russia in 1912 and 1914 used this day as an opportunity to raise awareness of the First World War. It is indeed a very important day for us as women and as people of the world.
The ruling party wants to acknowledge that the landscape for women's rights has changed dramatically over the past two decades, and that the fight for gender equality in many countries across the world, particularly ensuring that women and men enjoy equal rights, is no longer as much about women's legal status as about socioeconomic conditions that women face in their daily lives. We would like to take this opportunity to salute and pay tribute to the many women's and civil society organisations across the globe for their courageous and resolute fight for gender equality.
This year, as we commemorate International Women's Day, the people of the Republic of Haiti, Chile and Uganda continue to experience catastrophic disasters, which have claimed hundreds of lives and left many women and children in even more desperate conditions of destitution, hunger, homelessness and violence. We want to take this opportunity to reaffirm our continued support for the people of Haiti, Chile and Uganda, in particular women, as they undertake the daunting task of reclaiming and rebuilding their lives. We want to call on aid agencies such as the United Nations, and government leaders, including the government of our country, to expand their focus in prioritising the provision of aid and assistance to women and children.
We also want to take this opportunity to express our solidarity with the women of all conflict-ridden regions of the world, especially in Palestine, Darfur, Somalia, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Saudi Arabia.
Our nation commemorates International Women's Day just 15 years after we made a clarion call and commitment to dismantle all discriminatory legislation and practices. As much as we acknowledge that our nation has made enormous progress in dismantling discriminatory legislation, policies and practices that undermine and attack the dignity and rights of women, we are also concerned that we have not moved decisively in expanding opportunities and programmes that are geared to the final dismantling of all these discriminatory laws. We want to see a more resolute political will and firm commitment to equal rights and opportunities for women.
As a country, as much as we are proud that we are amongst the ten nations of the world with the highest representation of women in Parliament and in the executive, we are also under no illusion the daunting challenges that lie ahead are still numerous.
We are also aware that the battle for gender equality has shifted towards putting together all our efforts to ensure that women genuinely experience a better quality of life and equality in all aspects of their lives.
We continue to be concerned by the fact that, despite the rights espoused by our Constitution and the wide range of legislation, women in South Africa and the world remain largely marginalised and subjected to conditions that attack their dignity.
As we as South Africa, which is characterised by unequal rights and opportunities for women and men, join the rest of the world to reaffirm our commitment, we are concerned by the slow pace and progress in making this a reality. We are concerned that women in South Africa are still trapped in poverty, unemployment, illiteracy and poor health, and are subjected to the harshest social conditions. Our gains will mean nothing if we do not address the reality of the daily experiences of poor South Africans.
The struggle for gender equality is firmly located within the Millennium Development Goals in our Medium-Term Expenditure Framework and we want the state to proceed with this.
I want to move to 2010 as a year in which we are all celebrating and which we are looking forward to. As the ruling party, we had an opportunity over the weekend to have a presentation by Sizwe and Associates, identifying what the opportunities and threats for us as women in 2010 are.
Amongst the threats we identified were child trafficking and the prostitution of women. As much as there is huge excitement about the 2010 Soccer World Cup - and there is good reason for this, since it is the biggest sporting event in the world and an opportunity for South African women to show the world how far we have come - there is also the global threat that such events can act as a drawcard for sex trafficking to the host country.
We want to tell the world to come and see our country, but not our women. We are aware that the preponderance of women among prostituted people is a reflection of the reality of continued oppression on the basis of sex and gender. [Applause.] The vast majority of these women are poor, with 73% of prostituted women being homeless. In South Africa women continue to be vulnerable to being prostituted by male-dominated rings. Prostitution is the cornerstone institution of the system of inequality between the sexes. We say that no one chooses their sex, but sex is the single most powerful determinant of whether or not someone will be prostituted. This is shown by the fact that despite both men's and women's living in poverty, the vast majority, some 90%, of people in prostitution are women.
In addressing the issue of the alleged choice of women, most people say women choose to be prostituted and can leave if they want to. However, studies conducted show that 89% of women who are being prostituted say they want to leave prostitution, but have no other option for economic survival, suggesting that social and other factors are coercing women into prostitution rather than that they are choosing to be prostituted.
So we'd like to urge the Minister of Police to put measures in place to make sure that the state prevents prostitution of children and women, both local and foreign. We have information that already 40 000 women are being recruited to be prostituted in our country. As women, we are demanding that there be measures to make sure that indeed our women and children are not prostituted.
We also request the Minister of Women, Children and People with Disabilities to ensure that women and children are alerted to the dangers of human trafficking and that the Minister of Social Development and I establish effective programmes to educate and support women to avoid the dangers of sexual exploitation. As South Africans, both men and women, it is our responsibility to keep our women and children safe, not only during the World Cup, but at all times. The achievement of gender equality will only be realised with leadership and commitment from both men and women. The Southern African Development Community Protocol, Article 13, commits all of us to "ensure the inclusion of men in all gender-related activities, including gender training and community mobilisation", which means that we all, men and women, bear the responsibility of combating the abuse of the human rights of women and children, and that we must support initiatives where men are also actively involved in the efforts of women.
We have a very clear commitment to gender equality at the national and regional levels. We must not give up pursuing our goal of closing the gap between the daily experiences of women in South Africa and the aspirations expressed in our Constitution.
In closing, I want to quote what we said in 1994:
Women cannot march on one leg or clap with one hand.
Madiba said in 1994 when he opened this Parliament:
Freedom cannot be achieved unless the women have been emancipated from all forms of oppression.
All of us should take on board the fact that the objectives of the Reconstruction and Development Programme will not have been realised unless we see visible, practical evidence that the conditions of women in our country have radically changed for the better, in that they have been empowered to intervene in all aspects of life as equals with any other member of society.
As the ruling party we want to affirm our commitment to remaining in the forefront of the struggle to address and improve the conditions of women in our country. We cannot, as a nation, afford to have such high numbers of women with no access to adequate health care; who die from curable diseases; who continue to lag behind in education; and who suffer violence and abuse on a daily basis. For as long as there are these stark disparities in access to opportunities and the majority of those who live in poverty are women, emancipation in our country is incomplete.
We therefore call on this House to embrace this year's theme put forward by the United Nations, namely that all of us have to fight for equal rights and equal opportunities and ensure that there is progress for all. I thank you, Chair. [Applause.]