WMC felicitated the 13 female Members of Parliament elected to the 7th Parliament of Sri Lanka from the 2010 Parliamentary Election. Minister of Child Development & Women’s Affairs Tissa Karaliyadde was Chief Guest at the event. Those felicitated included Sumedha Jayasena, Nirupama Rajapakse, Sudarshani Fernandopulle, Rosy Senanayake, Malani Fonseka, Kamala Ranatunga, Thalatha Atukorale, Sriyani Wijewickrama, … Continue reading Felicitation ceremony for the women MPs of the 7th Parliament

Recently, the Women and Media Collective facilitated a consultation meeting on the CEDAW Shadow Report at CENWOR, on the 03rd of August 2009. The meeting was attended by over 50 participants from WMC’s network organizations based inColomboand the Suburbs. At the meeting, the chapters compiled under the 2002-2009 Shadow Report were presented and discussed. An … Continue reading Consultation meeting (2010) on the CEDAW Shadow Report

WMC organized an extensive media campaign in order to raise awareness about the limited representation of women in the Sri Lankan political arena and to increase women’s participation at the 2010 Parliamentary Election. Newspaper advertisementswere published in leading Sinhala, Tamil and English language newspapers highlighting the fact that although 52% of the country’s population consists of … Continue reading Media Campaign for increasing women’s participation at the 2010 Parliamentary Election

A media briefing was held on the 17th of February 2010 where all party representatives addressed the media on issues related to women’s representation at elections and in particular about increasing the number of women nominations for the upcoming parliamentary election. Some of the speakers at the event included Western Provincial Council MPs Ashoka Lankathilake … Continue reading Media Briefing on Increasing Women’s Participation at the 2010 Parliamentary Election

In Sri Lanka women constitute less than 6% of Parliament, 5% of Provincial Councils and 2% in Local Councils. These statistics are the lowest in South Asia and Sri Lanka is the only country in the region without a quota for women in Local Councils. One of the main reasons for such low representation has … Continue reading Nominations and Votes for Women

ACTFORM organized a consultation meeting on the 2nd and 3rd of October, 2009 to discuss the Migrant Rights Shadow Report and the upcoming Global Forum for Migration and Development (GFMD). The meeting focused on three issues; remittances, integration, and reintegration. Some of the proposals made included a formalized/official method for the investment of migrant workers’ … Continue reading Sri Lanka National Consultation on the GFMD


A series of awareness building programmes were held in Nittambuwan, Puttlam, Mathugama, Horana, Kalutara, Hambantota, Rambukkana and Kandy. They focused on the government’s decision to impose restrictions on migration of women with children below 5 years of age and familiarized the participants on the report submitted to MWC by non governmental organizations regarding the protection … Continue reading Awareness Building Programme