Women empowerment, as the International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA)-Ghana understands it, is not all a matter of pitching women against men. Instead, it is about impressing upon men to understand that women also have rights. In this regard, FIDA-Ghana's new approach to empowering women to insist on their rights includes engaging men of varying backgrounds in discussions. Mrs Susan Aryeetey, Resource Mobilization Officer, says "We recognize that women live with men" therefore, the Federation has diversified its approaches and now meets with males including chiefs, opinion leaders, assemblymen, artisans, etc. and discusses the various laws with them. The rationale is "Just to demystify the fact that FIDA is just here to pitch the women against the men. That's not true. The whole idea is to work together with both the men and the women. If we work together with the men we will be able to achieve women's rights. So that's the new approach," Mrs. Aryeetey explains. What FIDA-Ghana is FIDA-Ghana is the local chapter of the Federacion Internacionale de Abogadas, (FIDA) Spanish for International Federation of Women Lawyers, which was founded in Mexico in 1944 by a group of women lawyers from five (5) American countries. It was introduced to Ghana in 1968 by a group of Ghanaian women lawyers who were individual members of the international body. FIDA-Ghana was formally launched in 1974. Currently, the Resource Mobilization Officer puts the number of members at 40 from across Ghana and it is represented in eight regions of the country. It is a non-profit, non-partisan and non-governmental membership organization, committed to the enhancement of the status of Ghanaian women and children through legal aid, research and publications. Activities According to Mrs Aryeetey, FIDA-Ghana essentially provides legal support in the form of mediation and arbitration and sometimes court representation to clients. Specific activities include holding legal seminars twice a week, organizing mobile legal outreaches in communities, providing legal literacy education, and training paralegals. The Federation also undertakes research studies, findings of which inform its advocacy work. Another thing it does is to simplify the laws, especially those that affect women and children.. "Basically we just want to try and make the law accessible to people. Because law is seen as an expert area...but everybody in the society must be able to know the laws that protect them." Collaborations/ Funding The Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) and the Women's Initiative for Self Empowerment (WISE) are some of FIDA-Ghana's major collaborators. The Federation also collaborates with other women's rights organisations locally and internationally, as well as, with state institutions like the judiciary, the Attorney-General's Office, etc. Since 2006, it has enjoyed funding from the Ghana Research and Advocacy Programme (G-RAP). The latest support is a core support amounting to 140,000 dollars secured 18 months from July 2008 to December 2009. Through the support FIDA-Ghana hopes to add to its vital intellectual resources that can be used to provide advocacy in promoting the rights of women. Also, that same resource will be available for policy makers to input into their programmes. The Federation has been able to review and reduce a rather ambiguous ten-year development plan into a simple five-year plan with the help of funding from G-RAP. It has also been able to extend its coverage, attracted more funds and employed more staff including an additional programme officer. Achievements Mrs. Aryeetey says "A landmark achievement is that FIDA has been recognized as an organisation speaking for women. At least ...we have been able to establish ourselves as a credible organisation ...we speak on behalf of women whose rights have been abused." The success story is incomplete except we are able to tell how the constituents had benefited. Women whom FIDA-Ghana has dealt with are better empowered. The empowered woman "is the one who knows and uses the law to achieve what she wants." Towards the 2000 and 2004 presidential and parliamentary elections in Ghana, the Federation undertook a series of advocacy, gender sensitization and awareness creation activities to educate women on the electoral process. Consequently, the various political parties were encouraged to nominate more women parliamentarians. Similarly, FIDA-Ghana's advocacy resulted in an increased participation of women in the 2002 District Level Elections. According to FIDA-Ghana, the Electoral Commission's statistics indicate that 983 women contested in 2002 as compared to 547 women who contested in 1998. Besides, 362 women won seats to the District Assemblies as compared to 157 in 1998. Another area of success is that Government also responded to calls by FIDA and other NGOs to appoint more women in assemblies through its affirmative policy action of appointing a third of government appointees as women. Future outlook The Attorney-General's Department is reviewing PNDC Law 111. FIDA-Ghana is waiting on the lines to forward its findings in a research conducted on the law. Mrs. Aryeetey said the findings gave an idea of the gaps in the law. Also ahead is the dissemination of findings of a study the FIDA-Ghana conducted to investigate the problems of women living with HIV/AIDS. It will organise policy dialogues and awareness creation programmes as part of the dissemination of the results. Source: Public Agenda