The Session of ‘Leaders of Change- I support Gender Equality’ under the moderation of Mrs. Müjgan Suver – the President of EU and Human Rights Platform – within the framework of the 19th Eurasian Economic Summit having been held on Wednesday, April 6, 2016, at WOW Hotel İstanbul was completed successfully.

During the meeting started with the ‘Welcome Salutation’ of Mrs. Suver, the First Lady of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus H.E. Meral Akıncı and H.E. Alenka Bratusek – Former Prime Minister of Slovenia (2013-2014) gave opening speeches.

During her address Mrs Akıncı emphasized that Social Gender Equality would shed a strong light on the peace culture. Mrs Bratusek stated that media organs had not been interested in her political deeds but in her clothes and finery during her tenure at the office; so as to terminate the weight of men on politics and business world, women ought to come into sight more often.

The panel section of the meeting began with the presentation, entitled ‘The Story of 100th Monkey’, of Mrs. Müjgan Suver. During her presentation, she pointed out the fact that so as to facilitate the social equality, transformation of mind set to be transmitted from generation to generation is of necessity; in the event of its provision, this would be reflected into all fields of life and would result in an advanced democracy and developed economy for the society.

Of the panellists, Hon. Dr. Handan Toprak Benli – the Mayor of İstanbul Avcılar Municipality –, told about the projects her administration has been carrying out pertaining to the social equality. Mrs Benli, emphasizing their woman-friendly municipal concept, said to have established the first woman family directorate in Avcılar, Istanbul, presented certification courses directed to the parents for non-discriminative approach to male and female child. Mrs. Benli defended the viewpoint that Gender Equality could not be facilitated without the willingness of man.

Ilter Terzioğlu, Deputy General Manager of Turkcell, equality of opportunities executed under the umbrella of Turkcell the decisions to be made for the purpose of gender equality have been ranked on the first place, that 8.000 out of 18.000 employees at the companies under Turkcell have been composed of women.

Ferruh Tunç, the Turkey Director of KPMG, said during his address that woman in business life ought to become successful not by masculinising herself but by behaving as she is. Besides, in order to enable the equality of women in the social life, the myths related to the social inequality of women should be terminated and the prevailing language be broken as well.

Mustafa Tankut Turnaoğlu – the General Manager of Procter&Gamble to Turkey –,starting his address via the presentation of ‘VTR of the LikeGirl Campaign’, told that they have not discriminated any employees in terms personal traits such as gender, race, belief, age and etc., proceeding from the strategy of Diversity & Inclusion, adding that all kinds of diversity being considered an enrichment during and in the aftermath of the recruitment procedures, on the contrary.
Prof. Dr. Danica Purg – Founding President of IEDC-Bled School of Management in Bled, Slovenia – said ‘Woman must be brave; the social gender equality has been the basic term of human rights and a requirement of economic.’ Those who are supposed to bring about the transformation in every country are women – the subjects of this change – regardless of considering their religion, ideology and welfare level.

H.E. Edita Tahiri, the Minister of Dialogue of Kosovo, giving examples for the challenges she faced with in her personal history as a woman, drew attention to the importance of implementation of quote, which is to be designated with the purpose of rendering more participation of women in business and political life. ‘A quote campaign was regulated at the post-war politics in Kosovo, a quote is, in fact, of artificial nature and a practice to be lifted in the event that the mind set of people have changed. For a new mind set, we ought to constitute new models’.

Damir Masic, the political director of Social Democrat Party and parliamentarian of the Bosnia and Herzegovina, the present election laws should be amended and gender equality can be easier achieved with the sufficient representation of women. The mechanisms and sustainable structures supposed to provide the gender equality should be constituted on state and local administrative level.

Designer Letizia Reuss, pointing the masculine dominance on the World of art, the weight of women has become more visible with the prevalence of the struggle women having demonstrated in the last years.

On her address, Camilla Habsburg Lothringen, the archduchess of Toscana stated to have believed in the strength of mothers; it is of vital importance that women must struggle for their own sights and decisions no matter which status they are ascribed to.

In the aftermath of the speakers of the panel, the family photo taken together with the other guests at the Session of ‘Leaders of Change’ and the final declaration of the related meeting as follows;

LEADERS OF CHANGE
‘I support Social Gender Equality’
THE FINAL DECLARATION THE MEETING

The exchange of experiences and the results of researches have proved the fact that companies under the leadership of women are more successful than the ones under the leadership of men. But still, the percentage of the women leaders has not been able to rise above 10% in both public and private sectors.

We observe the same picture when it comes to number of members in national parliaments and executive boards. All of the decision-making bodies and the meetings are still overwhelmingly composed of men.

In the light of above mentioned facts, it is essential to increase the number of women in decision- making bodies in both private and public sectors. And to achieve this, it is critical for institutions and policy-makers to apply quotas or alike practices so as to reach the percentage of 35% which is considered as the critical threshold from quality to quantity. There has to be a special women agenda in national parliaments, private and public institutions at least from now on.

• Today, for us having successful archetypes regarding this issue like the EU members, Parliaments of Slovenia and Kosovo, Municipality of Avcılar, and companies like Turkcell, P&G, and KPMG means that the other parliaments, administrations and companies can achieve success as well through implementing the same concept. According to the international agreements, putting away all the discriminative traditions and cliché and changing perceptions in societies; implementing applications that would help upgrade the status of women in the society and increasing the ratio of women in administrative positions; achieving the transformation of the society in the axis of the main purposes of creating gender-sensitive family, school and working environments are primarily, among the others, the duties of the governments.

• It is crucial to add the gender-equality to the Sustainable Development Agenda in addition to its environmental, social and economic axes. Upon this basis, governments must enjoy cooperation with private sector, universities and NGOs. We expect governments to make satisfactory explanations on how to define priorities, how to pursue the purposes, and how to monitor the data and the accountability regarding gender-equality.

• We are insistent on transparency, a stronger inspection and accountability during the process of implementations.

• Also we believe in the necessity of constituting independent evaluation mechanisms in order to oversee the developments at local, regional and international levels.