LYSA’s Vice President –Ex. Affairs Ms. Anita Thapa attended YLDA”s workshop on “empowering young women in politics” in Hongkong from 7-11 August, 2009.The objective of the women workshop was to reach out  to a more specific group-young, liberal women leaders, bringing together, to provide with an avenue to discuss the challenges they face in entering politics, the reasons why it is important for women to be represented in the political process and help each other formulate their plans in becoming more visible in politics and empowering other women to be part of the process as well.

Fifteen participants represented YLDA’s member organizations/individual representation. The workshop touched upon different aspects related to women and politics and started with the presentation on the role of women in Liberalism and the importance of women in politics by Mr. Siegfried Herzog, Resident Representative –Friedrich Naumann Foundation, Philippines. He shared the factors about the equality and difference for women in politics and their contribution, where he highlighted that freedom is not complete without freedom for women.

We discussed on the importance of women in governance and politics and consolidated our discussion and also had country presentations. One of the interesting activities was world café session where we divided ourselves into three table host and bufferflies and brainstormed on different topics such as advocacy-oriented women’s organization for reforms, idealogical/political feminist organization and NGO’s working with women’s issues.

Then we also had an opportunity to know about the experiences of women in politics in Hongkong and Thailand as Ms. Josephine Chan Shu Ying, Vice Spokesperson-Women’s Policy, Democratic Party of Hongkong spoke on the topic: Deterrence-Issues and Challenges for Women’s Political Participation in Asia and Hon. Rachada Dhandirek, MP and also the Director of Young Democrat Program, Democrat Party, highlighted the best practices they have been adopting to encourage youth in politics.

On a final day of the workshop, we started with the group work to draft the manual of best practices for the women’s participation in politics. We brainstormed about the environment that could support women to join the politics and also how can women show their credibility. And we synthesized all the ideas during plenary discussions, and also made individual resolutions. The second half of the day progressed with the group discussion on what can we do with/within YLDA and how can we make individual contribution as a way forward. With the convention of YLDA Women’s Core Group, we also came up with the YLDA Declaration on Women’s rights to Political Participation.

The workshop was moderated by Ms. Yeen Seen Ng, Deputy Director General, SEDAR Institute, Malaysia.