NAC Participates in Pan African Conference- Women in Management and Leadership Conference. ‘Leading in Addressing Inequalities’

The month of March is dedicated to celebrating women, fostering women empowerment and dispelling gender inequalities.

Pan African Conference is a platform that has been dedicated to empowering women in various aspects of life for a decade now. It brings together women leaders with accomplished accolades from different countries and various fields of disciplines to discuss strategies for building networks, closing gender gaps, fostering economic empowerment for women among other topics. The Conference is also attended by women from all stages of life, who are determined to learn and grow through networking.

Women worldwide continue to face inequalities. These inequalities have a detrimental effect not only to the woman but to the society at large and they bring about barriers in access to social services including health access. The Pan African Conference for Women in Leadership and Management seeks to bridge these gaps by providing knowledge, resources, and networking opportunities that enable women to realize their abilities.

The 10^th Pan African Conference in Malawi was held this year along the lakeshore in  Mangochi at Ekhaya Resort   Hotel from 25^th  to 28^th February 2025 under the theme ‘Accelerating Action’.

Amongst the key speakers at the function was the National AIDS Commission Chief Executive Officer, Dr. Beatrice Matanje who was asked to inspire fellow women with a topic that focused on ‘Role Modelling and mentorship: Building networks and support systems for Women leaders’. She shared her professional and career journey  and the activities that she has been doing in uplifting the livelihoods of girls and women at community level. In her presentation, she discussed qualities of role models and what each quality entails. The participants were brought to the attention that, even role models do have challenges along their journey of life but those challenges never stop them from moving forward in pursuit of their agenda for personal growth and supporting others

Taona Chibonga Phiri, a NAC employee attended the conference and she has this to say; ‘the session was enlightening and motivational and I will always look forward to achieving more in my current role so that some young women could get inspired with my achievements at the institutions’

Collaborating with her, Getrude Nsini a Coordination and Capacity Building officer at NAC expressed satisfaction with the session. She implored that the conference will improve her efficiencies in coordinating the National Response to HIV and AIDS.

The Conference provided women with the tools and knowledge as they will be playing various roles in their societies and organizations, hence reducing inequalities which has been a major setback of development in African countries including Malawi.