How Freetown's First Woman Mayor Yvonne Aki Sawyerr Is Improving Her City | NowThis

‘Less testosterone at the table is often a helpful thing.’ — Meet Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, the first elected woman mayor of Freetown, Sierra Leone.
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The first woman elected mayor of Sierra Leone’s capital has a unique plan of action to address the city’s challenges.

Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, Mayor of Freetown: 'During the campaign people often said to me, ‘oh so what do you think about this as a woman?’ And I would say, I'm first and foremost a professional. I happen to be a woman. Now, one year and two months into office. I'm beginning to see this differently. I do think there's a really really important space that women have to occupy and the reason is because we look at life through a different lens.

Our literacy rate is 40 percent but when it comes to women it drops down really just dramatically to about half of that. So whether we're talking about education whether took my skills development whether to my job creation or persons with disability we have very deliberately said in everything we're doing, we're giving an additional advantage to women to make sure that is a greater percentage of all of those opportunities are directed towards women.

When we talk about migration in the mayors mayors Migration Council we are focused on 360 vision of migration diaspora going back migrants moving out but in every single piece of that there has to be humanity and compassion. And there has to be choice provided. So no one is acting from a position of desperation

In our own particular context in Freetown in Sierra Leone, what we're seeing is that migration that increasing population has on a really practical level meant that in the absence of proper policies and planning indiscriminate cutting down of trees so the loss of forestation the loss of mangroves which are critical to biodiversity. The issues of climate change are transboundary. You know, what's going on in China what's going on in the US what's goigrigrating on in Uganda is affecting everyone.



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