:: Good Governance is priority at the Lebanese Council of Women ::
Good governance, transparency, and accountability were, the order of the day at the Lebanese Press Order conference room, Wednesday September 21, 2005. The Lebanese Council of Women (LCW) held a press conference to announce, “The successful conclusion of the first phase of its restructuring process aimed at modernizing its administrative structure”.
Mohammad Baalbaki, President of the Lebanese Press Federation, presented Ms. Faika Turkiyeh, the president of LCW who went on to explain the specifics of the project “titled Good Governance & Optimization of Resources - part I: Survey and Database Creation”.
Then Mr. Raouf Yussef, the head of USAID in Lebanon, the organization that funded the project under the Transparency and Accountability Grant (TAG) project managed by AMIDEAST/Lebanon, stressed their interest in the project and their support to the restructuring process launched by LCW.
The written media, televisions and radio stations covered the event. Lebanese officials, independent NGOs and activists, in fact more than 100 persons attended the press conference, which is no ordinary matter considering that the event concerned the internal works of an NGO.
The importance of the event resides in many factors including the constituency of LCW and its potential role.
Ms Turkiyeh considered that “LCW -with its wide network of several thousands members spread geographically over the whole Lebanese territory and representing the cultural and ethnic diversity of Lebanon- has the potential to act as a catalyst on the national level in order to mobilize and effectively promote the current general objectives of the Lebanese women’s rights movement.”
Another factor is the relevance of the concepts of good governance, transparency, and accountability to the actual Lebanese concern with rebuilding national institutions and fighting corruption.
This press conference came in the same week that saw the preparatory meeting of the donor nations held in support of Lebanon on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly sitting, where the main stress was on the need for Lebanon to implement economic reform, in particular curb corruption, and promote transparency.
The President of LCW was very much in line with these expectations when in her speech she stated “in order to realize the objectives set in the strategy (of LCW), the Committee saw the necessity of modernizing the administrative structure of the Lebanese Council of Women according to the principles of transparency and accountability and good governance.”
Mr. Yussef stressed in his address the importance of NGOs in the restructuring process. “Lebanon, long known to have an active civil society is facing a number of challenges. These challenges require the civil society organizations to double their efforts in view of the expectations placed on them and their role in building and developing the society as a whole, as well as playing a lead role in the improvement and advancement processes.” |
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