FIFTY-TWO Guyanese women of African descent are being honoured by the newly established Women and Gender Equality Commission.
They will be honoured through a special limited edition publication in which they are featured, and an awards ceremony and cultural event which the Commission is sponsoring to mark the International Year of Peoples of African Descent, on Saturday, August 27 at 14:30hrs, at the National Cultural Centre. The event is being held under the theme: “Recognition, Justice and Development”.
The commission recognises that the selected honorees represent only a sample of outstanding Guyanese women of African heritage in Guyana, and will use the occasion to celebrate all African-Guyanese women.
The event will be hosted by media personalities, Margaret Lawrence and Ron Robinson, with Ras Leon Saul organising the cultural performances. The awards are designed and produced by the Black Jewel company, and Sheik Hassan Printery is producing the limited edition publication for presentation to the women being honoured.
The commission has invited the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, the UN and Caricom representatives and its own veteran member, Ms. Magda Pollard, to present the awards to the African-Guyanese women who are being recognised.
The special publication, featuring a portrait and profile of each of the 52 women being recognised, also has a historical note naming and honouring African heroines in the days of slavery and freedom struggles, and during emancipation, as well as a roll call of the African-Guyanese women who were amongst a wider cross-section of women honoured in a previous publication of the Women’s Affairs Bureau in 1997 – “Guyanese Women in Focus”.
The public is invited to the event.