Women have played a pivotal role in South Africa\u2019s response to the Coronavirus pandemic, says President Cyril Ramaphosa.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe salute the resilience and bravery of women frontline workers who worked to fight the pandemic as nurses, doctors, emergency personnel, police and soldiers,\u201d President Ramaphosa said on Monday.<\/p>\n
In his weekly newsletter, celebrating International Women\u2019s Day, President Ramaphosa thanked all the women leading civil society organisations who worked and continue to work with the Ministerial Advisory Committee in driving a holistic approach to managing the pandemic.<\/p>\n
The theme for this year\u2019s International Women\u2019s Day is: \u201d Women\u2019s leadership and achieving an equal future in a COVID-19 world\u201d.<\/p>\n
President Ramaphosa said there can be no meaningful progress for women if society continues to relegate women to \u2018traditional\u2019 professions, occupations or roles, while it is mainly men who sit on decision-making structures.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe salute women like Nandi Msezane, who helped raise funds for food support in affected communities, and helped to provide access to mental health support for the LGBTQI+ [ lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersex] community during the lockdown.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe dedication of the nation\u2019s educators has ensured that our young people were able to receive an education despite the disruption caused by the pandemic. We owe a debt of gratitude to the many women who have worked as teachers, principals, lecturers and as administrators at institutions of higher learning.<\/p>\n
\u201cWomen doctors, researchers and scientists have played and continue to play an important role in our epidemiological response,\u201d President Ramaphosa said.<\/p>\n
The President said women and children affected by violence during the lockdown were helped, thanks to the efforts of numerous non-governmental organisations (NGOs) led by and staffed by women.<\/p>\n
President Ramaphosa said research performed by academics on economic vulnerability and poverty trends in South Africa helped drive an informed relief response.<\/p>\n
\u201cLast year we lost one of the country\u2019s foremost experts on rural poverty, Dr Vuyo Mahlati. At the time she was studying the impact of the pandemic on food security in vulnerable communities, especially small scale farmers,\u201d the President said.<\/p>\n
President Ramaphosa also recognized the role of women in government whose efforts often go unacknowledged.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is women who lead the many government departments at the forefront of the national relief response.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur experience of this pandemic has once more demonstrated women\u2019s capacity to organise, collaborate, lead and achieve. Through their actions, they have demonstrated there is no such thing as \u2018a woman\u2019s place,\u2019 President Ramaphosa said. \u2013 SAnews.gov.za<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Women have played a pivotal role in South Africa\u2019s response to the Coronavirus pandemic, says President Cyril Ramaphosa. \u201cWe salute the resilience and bravery of women frontline workers who worked to fight the pandemic as nurses, doctors, emergency personnel, police and soldiers,\u201d President Ramaphosa said on Monday. In his weekly newsletter, celebrating International Women\u2019s Day, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[38678],"class_list":{"0":"post-182744","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-sanews","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182744"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182744\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}