By A Staff Reporter
Kathmandu, Mar. 8:  President Bidya Devi Bhandari, Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli and other leaders have extended their best wishes to all the women on the occasion of the 111th International Women's Day which is being marked across the globe with the theme 'Women in leadership: Achieving an equal future in a COVID-19 world on Monday.
In her message issued here today, President Bhandari stressed the need for additional effort for the implementation the provision of women’s proportional representations in political and public domains.
She said, “To achieve the goal of gender equality, women’s equal access to education, health employment, public service, facility and opportunity should be ensured.”
The IWD is being observed in Nepal with the slogan 'Women's security, respect, and employment: bases of prosperous Nepal'.
Likewise, in his message, Prime Minister Oli said, "The participation and leadership of women in Nepal's political, economic and social arrangements have always been exemplary to the world," The fact that women had led all the movements that took place in Nepal, including the historic people's movement by being in the front-line has been written with 'golden words' in history of Nepali politics."
Stating that more than half of the population of Nepal was women, Prime Minister Oli said that equal participation of women was mandatory for the nation's development.
"As a result of the policy-level, legal, organisational and procedural improvements brought the nation to ensure gender equality and women's development, the representation of women has increased remarkably in politics and administration," said the Prime Minister.
He added that positive improvements had been observed in the indicators such as education, health, and employment among others.
The Prime Minister, on the occasion of IWD, urged all Nepali men and women to cooperate in the government's campaign of empowering women by ending violence against women and developing the culture of respecting women.
Likewise, in his message, leader of the main Opposition Nepali Congress and former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba hoped that the Women’s Day would help the people be aware to control all kinds of violence against women.