Family protection: special support fund requested

The Colloquium on 50 years of promotion of the Family ended on May 9 in Yaounde. A Special Fund to assist families develop income-generating activities so as to secure empowerment, featured prominently among the recommendations made by participants on Friday, May 9, 2014 at the end of the National Colloquium organised in Yaounde by the Ministry of Women Empowerment and the Family (MINPROFF). The aim was to assess 50 years of the promotion and the protection of the family in Cameroon.

The colloquium that began on Thursday, May 8, under the auspices of the Prime Minister and Head of Government and presided at by the Minister of Women Empowerment and the Family, Prof. Marie Thérèse Abena Ondoa, saw government officials, traditional authorities, as well as experts in sociology, psychology anthropology, amongst others, brainstorming on burning issues related to the evolution of the Cameroonian family and suggesting appropriate strategies for a better protection of the family while establishing ways for a more effective participation of the Cameroonian family in the attainment of emergence by the year 2035.

Thus, topics discussed touched on issues such as marriage, sexuality, parenthood, education, health, religion and the promotion of family values. Other recommendations read by MINPROFF’s Sub-director in charge of the promotion of the rights of the child acting as the Colloquium’s rapporteur, Yolande Abena, included the adoption and promulgation of the Persons and Family Code, the creation of a monitoring and evaluation mechanism for government projects for family empowerment, the strengthening of social security measures as well as the re-launch holiday camps and other youth activities to strengthen civic awareness.

Acknowledging the work done, Prof. Marie Thérèse Abena Ondoa urged the experts to continue in same vein to ensure the implementation in a bid to reinstate the family as the basic unit of society. She implored traditional chiefs to help curb certain phenomena such as violence on women and children and check extravagant bride prices. “The bride price must return to its symbolic character so that regrettable legal consequences should be avoided,” she prayed before declaring closed the colloquium that was organised as part of activities to mark the 20th International Day of Families, scheduled for May 15.