Source: All Africa
The Secretary General of the Sierra Leone Market Women's Association, Madam Marie Bob-Kandeh has said that market women will hold successive governments accountable should they fail to adhere to
the recommendations that will come out of the Sierra Leone Conference on Development and Transformation slated for December 12 to 14 this year at the Miatta Conference Centre.
She was speaking at an exclusively all market women's consultative forum with the Gender Specialist at the Secretariat, Naasu Fofanah who brought together representatives from the various markets in the capital, Freetown in a bid to get their inputs on what role the market women should play as we plan for the next 25-50 years. "They will be held accountable if governments fail to adhere to what will be written as recommendations from the Conference," she said and added, "we have to make contributions to Sierra Leone's development or else we will be held responsible." Madam Marie Vandy, the President of the Market Women's Association said though they are the marginalized ones in society, this will not deter them in constructively engaging with the Secretariat to ensuring that the market women play a key role in planning for the development of Sierra Leone .
She vowed that as the country prepares a development roadmap for the next 25-50 years, they will take a lead role in ensuring that this country is developed and, "our generations yet unborn are well catered for."
The President said the effort to plan for Sierra Leone should not be left in the hands of President Koroma and his APC government alone but it should be seen as a national effort that will outlive succeeding governments.
The market women were unanimous in stating that they will like to see a Sierra Leone where "our natural resources are well managed, education is given a priority, there is free health care for all, factories are constructed to provide job opportunities for Sierra Leoneans, there is abundance foreign exchange and the country is food sufficient among others."
They pledged to put in writing a position paper that will be presented to the Secretariat as part of their input to the Conference. The Conference in December is about reviewing the whole spectrum of Sierra Leone's development as a nation since independence and determining where we want to be in the next 25-50 years and how best to get there without the pitfalls of the past .