By: Kebba AF Touray
Hon. Amadaou Camara, Member for Nianija Constituency, has told Lawmakers that the African governments are committed to sexual and reproductive health and rights.
Camara said this yesterday while laying the Report on the Network of African Parliamentary Committees of Health [NEAPACOH] Meeting, held in Kampala, Uganda from 30th to 31st October 2018, for parliamentary adoption and considerations.
He said the meeting aimed to assess progress made and lessons learned and identifying challenges for the achievement on the commitments made at the September 2017 meeting, have common understanding of the challenges and opportunities for SRHR in the post 2015 development agenda, share parliamentary experiences and innovative practices on the implementation of RH including FP commitments in the 2030 Agenda for sustainable development among others.
“The expected outcomes include increase knowledge and appreciation by policy makers and development partners of the linkages between FP/RH and development, committed political leadership for SRHR in the region, improve policies and increase resources for FP/RH in national budgets and create FP/HR champions in the region”, he highlighted.
He cited collaboration with leaders to optimize FP and population health issue, ensure monitoring and evaluation of reproductive health and family planning programs, deepen partnerships for south-south cooperation for the development in SRH outcomes and harnessing the demographic dividend as recommendations made at the meeting.
Legislators who participated in the debate, called for adequate allocation of resources to the health sectors, implementation of the Maputu declaration and the collective participation of the citizenry in making the Gambia a Healthy nation. The report after an intense debate was considered and adopted by the Legislators.
