KUALA LUMPUR: The Women and Family Development Ministry is pleased that more older Chinese and Indian women are participating in its family development programmes through two caucuses set up to cater to them.
“When the ministry initiated the programmes last year, women were hesitant to join in because of the language barrier, especially the older women,” said its Minister, Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil.
She said the Caucus for Chinese Women Leaders and Caucus for Indian Women Leaders were set up soon after.
Shahrizat said she was happy to note that more were coming forward as the programmes were conducted in their core languages by the Chinese and Indian non-governmental organisations (NGOs).
“However, I urge them to have a mixed group of participants in their programmes through the government allocations provided for them,” she said after presenting a special allocation of RM389,038 to the Caucus for Chinese Women Leaders and five Chinese women's NGOs yesterday.
They included Yayasan Wanita Cemerlang, Selangor Hokkien Association, Hock Por Sian Segamat Association, Federation of Malaysian Teochew Associations and Liong Kwong Jementah Association.
She said the allocation was an affirmative effort by the ministry as it was concerned that everyone should benefit from the programmes, irrespective of race.
“We don't want any group to be left out,” she said, adding that she expected 10,930 women to benefit with the allocation given out.
Shahrizat also said this was the second allocation for non-Muslim NGOs to enable greater participation of other races to become joint-venture partners with the Government.
The programmes lined up for the NGOs include family development, law and women’s rights literacy, parenting, leadership, anti-violence and HIV/AIDS campaigns.
Also present was Deputy Finance Minister Datuk Dr Ng Yen Yen, who is the patron of Yayasan Wanita Cemerlang.
