First Lady to use UN Conference to lobby for resources

First Lady Esther Lungu

First Lady Esther Lungu is optimistic that she will use United Nations (UN) Conference to lobby for resources to support women and girls’ empowerment in Zambia.

The First Lady arrived in New York yesterday for the sixty-First session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW61).

Mrs. Lungu says she will help Zambia mobilize resources for women and girls’ empowerment.

Mrs. Lungu  says Zambia’s participation at the 61st Session of the Commission on the Status of Women is of great importance.

She says the CSW61 is significant to Zambia and that the country will utilize the platform to highlight the milestones it has achieved in the protection and promotion of the welfare of women.

She states that Zambia’s cooperating partners will also want to hear the challenges that the nation is facing in its quest to provide protection and promotion of the women and children’s welfare.

Mrs. Lungu says the Esther Lungu Foundation Trust Act as one of the vehicles for the line ministries to use in delivering services to the people of Zambia, especially the less privileged.

Meanwhile, the First Lady will participate in the largest annual women’s gathering, which draws hundreds of participants from Government Ministers and officials, First Ladies, princesses, policy makers and implementers, heads of UN agencies and other international organizations, donor agencies, civil society organizations, corporate executives, women’s movement, celebrities, human rights activists and other stakeholders from across the world.

Gender Minister Victoria Kalima, will lead the Zambian delegation to the Sixty-First session of the Commission on the Status of Women.

The priority theme for CSW61 is “Women’s economic empowerment in the changing world of work” and the Review theme is “Challenges and achievements in the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals for women and girls (agreed conclusions of the fifty-eighth session) while emerging issue and focus area will be “the empowerment of indigenous women”.

Zambia has won international respect for its advocacy and implementation of policies and programmes that protect and promote the wellbeing of women and girls.

This is contained in a statement issued to QFM News by First Secretary for Press and Public Relations at the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Zambia to the United Nations Chibaula Silwamba.