Linked with FEMNET, The African Women’s Development and Communication Network, and with ECOSOCC The Economic, Social and Cultural Council of the African Union.
She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.
She says: « Sustainable peace cannot be established without the participation of women and girls ».
And she says: « My dream is to fight against social injustice, especially when it is directed against women ».
Mama Kotie Doumbia is a Malian politician and a member of the Economic, Social and Cultural Council of the African Union, representing West Africa. The Economic, Social and Cultural Council is an advisory body of the African Union charged with overseeing the development of those particular areas within the continent. To this end 10 Sectoral Cluster Committees were established to highlight these areas.
Read: World Social Forum Spotlights Africa’s Challenges, March 2, 2007.
Mama Koite Doumbia – Mali
She works also for Union Nationale des Travailleurs du Mali UNTM, and for Femnet, The African Women’s Development and Communication Network.
Mama Koité Doumbia, born in Thiès, Senegal, in 1950, holds a higher diploma in youth training. She is particularly well-known for her long support of union causes and her determination to find ways to re-inforce the capacities of national women’s NGOs in the area of training, speaking, communication, and leadership. She is married and has five children.
« The followers of Mama Koité recognize that she does not hold back from the fight and that she has no fear of difficulties and obstacles in her way. She is always motivated by a remarkable spirit of self-denial. For her, others take priority. This is the reason she fights, on a daily basis, for others, for general interests and the blossoming of a community in peace.
FEMNET is an important network that fights to defend of the rights of African women. It had done much to have the rights of African women taken into account. Thanks to FEMNET, several women’s projects have found funding partners. Nevertheless, it is necessary to recognize that this network although widely recognised in English-speaking Africa was not very well known in the French-speaking countries of Africa.
Madame Mama Koité Doumbia is known both nationally and internationally. She became the president of Femnet, the African Women’s Development and Communication Network. Her election was due to her long experience in teaching and as a union leader in Mali. Mama Koité knew how to persuade African women because of her union experiences. Since her election as a president she has mobilized Malian women to familiarize themselves with the objectives of the network and to make concrete suggestions. This was not in vain if you look at the results she obtained.
Mama Koité negotiates, creates awareness, informs, and educates in her everyday work. Her primary concern is to find ways to promote the well-being of both the Malian and African community. On the whole, she fights for a better world without violence. (1000PeaceWomen).
Read: OUR RIGHTS JULY – DECEMBER 2005, MAINSTREAMING GENDER IN THE MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS: AFRICAN PERSPECTIVES, 16 pdf-pages.
She says also: « Poverty as well as excess results from inequalities. Far more than just the redistribution of income, poverty is originated by the unequal sharing of goods, lack of access to social services and opportunities. In addition, poverty originates from the marginalization caused by ethnic affiliation, gender, social class, lack of information as well as non-participation in political life.
Wealth and power accumulation by a few people, a few powers and a few multinationals, is the cause of poverty. Quick and non-transparent transfer of governments’ power to corporations requires global governance with constraining rules.
Consequently, economic growth per se does not offer a solution that can help eradicate poverty, since the promotion of growth make that very growth a priority to the detriment of equity, rights and sustainable development.
In addition to the redistribution of incomes, the sharing of other resources can be part of the solution; but unfortunately, the inadequate tax systems that are in force in our countries can never remedy that inequality. External financial aid cannot substitute strategies of fighting poverty such as employment, agricultural reform and policies that are favorable to women’s promotion.
The Millennium Development Goals put an emphasis on a set of key objectives that must be achieved by the year 2015. This is capital for sub-Saharan Africa which is very far from achieving those goals. The draft Resolution by the President of the General Assembly stresses that the development challenge is much more complex and requires that many more problems be taken into account. Other important aspects, notably gender equality, ethnic affiliation, race, culture and empowerment of women must be mainstreamed in the MDGs and the Summits results.
The right to reproductive and sexual health, to health and social services must be an integral part of the Millennium +5 ». (full text).
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