SPC Director General, Colin Tukuitonga Visits Tonga Featured
Hon. Siaosi Sovaleni DPM of Tonga, Mrs. Pulupaki Ika Acting CEO of Internal Affairs, SPC Director General, Colin Tukuitonga, Mrs. Tupou Fakakovikaetau and Dr. Paula Vivili from SPC
Nuku'alofa, 30 July 2015. The Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) Director General, Colin Tukuitonga is on his first official visit to Tonga this week.
During his visit, a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed between the organization and the Government of Tonga, through the Ministry of Internal Affair’s Women’s Division (WAD). The acting Minister for Internal Affairs, Honourable Siaosi Sovaleni signed the MOU today at the MEIDECCC main office with the Director General.
The MOU is based on efforts to advance gender issues within government tasks and responsibilities and so SPC is assisting the Tongan Government in “Strengthening the Capacity of the Government of the Kingdom of Tonga in Mainstreaming Gender.” Through the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Women’s Affairs Division (WAD) is responsible for the Agreement and implementation of tasks as set out in the MOU.
SPC is providing technical assistance on the matter with the focus on gender mainstreaming, an area which the Women’s Affairs Division to working to enable and further strengthen among government ministries and agencies.
The SPC’s partnership with the Women’s Division has been longstanding. In 2010 the organization conducted a stock take of the Tongan Government to mainstream gender across government policies and programmes. The report found the need to assist the government in creating a strategic plan of action for ways to strengthen the gender mainstreaming capacity.
The activities of the MOU are based on the findings of this gender stock take as well as Tonga’s Revised National Policy on Gender and Development (RNPGAD) of which the lead agency is the Ministry of Internal Affairs (through WAD).
The purpose of strengthening gender mainstreaming is to increase the capacity of government staff to incorporate gender perspectives into their work and to integrate gender equity as a core development issue into short, medium and long term planning, and to deliver gender – responsive services to all of Tonga.
The initiative will also strengthen institutional processes, such as data collection and analysis, and monitoring mechanisms which government ministries and agencies can use with their own planning frameworks, and also feed into the government’s national strategic planning framework.
The MOU activities are to be implemented over a period of 2015 – 2018.
Source: Ministry of Internal Affairs
