Tina Thiart
South Africa
I vowed to dedicate myself to ensuring that women have equal access to resources
and opportunities.
I live in Cape Town and I work with the Women’s Funds and Community
Foundations in Southern Africa. I am a board member for the Southern Africa
Community Grantmakers forum, WINGS and Women’s Net. My role is to
work with the Women’s Funds on sustainability and advise them on corporate
fundraising. I am also an advisor on programs and grantmaking strategies for
women’s organisations.
I believe we also have to engage with the political space and there our work
needs to be directed on three levels: more women in politics, education and
training of women elected and influencing leaders of the government (which is
not easy in South Africa). As women we also need to organise more grassroots
women’s convening and meetings to ensure that we share with them our
strategies and organise learning and sharing opportunities.
I call myself a feminist because since I was very young, l I have been angry when
I saw inequality. Growing up in a poor community where race discrimination
was huge, and the use of financial resources to advance our male partners
was very disturbing. So I vowed to dedicate myself to ensuring that women
have equal access to resources and opportunities in my country. Today still
although apartheid has been abandoned we still see much inequality and
women’s empowerment needs more attention.
In my personal and professional life, I have been part of the Women’s Funding
Movement in South Africa and Internationally. I am involved in donor education
and network with both business and civil society. My contributions are not big,
but I am proud of the work we have done in the region.
The biggest challenge to feminists in Africa is the access to resources, financial,
land, energy, technology and skills. To address this, we need to mobilise
more resources for women’s empowerment, support women to challenge the
government on basic needs of women (land, water energy) and organise more
skills training and networking opportunities.
What really inspires me is to see the young people excel and use the
opportunities that have been created by so many women before them. I am
also very inspired by grassroots women’s organisations that are sustainable
and that with many volunteers are able to do the work without much financial
contributions from external sources. They just deal with the issues that they face
on a daily basis.
VPS II
. 123