Southern Africa: Gender Alliance launches 2030 campaign

Johannesburg, 12 August 2026: Gender equality advocates from across Southern Africa will gather in Johannesburg on 16 and 17 August to shape a 2030 Campaign to protect hard won gains, confront growing pushback against gender equality and strengthen regional accountability through the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development.

Convened by the Southern Africa Gender Protocol Alliance, the two day gathering comes at a critical moment for the region. Despite significant legal and policy gains, women and girls continue to face persistent gender based violence, unequal political and economic participation, threats to sexual and reproductive health and rights, shrinking civic space and increasingly organised anti rights mobilisation.

The Alliance, a regional network of networks established in 2005, successfully campaigned for the adoption of the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development in 2008. Almost two decades later, members are asking whether the regional instrument fully responds to the realities, challenges and opportunities facing women and girls today.

“Since 2005, we have been on a gender transformative journey across the region. While important progress has been made, those gains are now at risk because key priorities and lessons are being overlooked,” says Emma Kaliya, Co-Chair of the Southern Africa Gender Protocol Alliance

On Sunday, 16 August, Alliance country focal points, thematic Cluster Leads and members will meet internally to take stock of progress, identify common regional concerns and agree priorities for collective action.

Rather than approaching the region country by country, the meeting will use the Alliance’s thematic clusters to identify issues cutting across Southern Africa, drawing on country experience to show where challenges are shared and where particular contexts require greater attention.

Members will consider evidence from the Gender Protocol Barometer, country and thematic experience, and a new rationale paper examining the case for strengthening and updating the SADC Protocol.

The discussions will feed into the emerging 2030 Campaign, which seeks to ensure that the countdown to 2030 is accompanied by renewed political urgency, measurable accountability and meaningful civil society participation.

The programme will also examine the growing regional and global pushback against gender equality, including challenges to bodily autonomy, sexual and reproductive health and rights, gender diversity and the participation of women in public and political life.

On Monday, 17 August, the Alliance will take the discussion into a broader High Level Dialogue: From Civil Society Demand to Regional Action.

The dialogue will bring Alliance members into conversation with regional institutions, parliamentary actors, government, legal and human rights experts and specialist civil society partners on the future of the Protocol and practical pathways for continued regional engagement.

Among the questions on the table will be:

- What has changed since the Protocol was last reviewed?
- Which implementation gaps require stronger regional accountability?
- What emerging gender equality issues are not adequately reflected in the existing framework?
- How should Southern Africa respond collectively to organised anti rights and anti gender pushback?
- What role should civil society, parliamentarians, governments and regional institutions play in shaping the gender equality agenda to 2030 and beyond?

The Alliance will also engage the SADC Parliamentary Forum through a focused roundtable on legal reform, domestication, parliamentary oversight and regional accountability.

The Johannesburg dialogue takes place as regional leaders and civil society converge around the SADC Heads of State Summit processes, providing an opportunity to ensure that gender equality remains firmly on the regional political agenda.

From 18 to 21 August, Alliance members will carry the 2030 Campaign into the Civil Society Forum in Durban, convened alongside the SADC Heads of State Summit processes. Drawing on country and cluster evidence, they will contribute to thematic sessions and advocacy spaces, use the Gender Protocol Barometer to press for implementation and strengthening of the Protocol, and build wider civil society support for collective action to 2030.

The High Level Dialogue will be followed by the launch of the 2026 Gender and Media Progress Study (GMPS), which will bring fresh regional evidence on whose voices are heard, whose stories are told and how far Southern African media have progressed towards gender equality.

Together, the Alliance convening, High Level Dialogue and evidence generated through the Barometers and GMPS form part of a broader effort to turn regional commitments into action and results.

#PushForward4Equality | #2030Campaign

For more information and media enquiries
Tabetha Kanengoni, Director of Programmes, Email: dop@genderlinks.org.za
Colleen Lowe Morna, Special Advisor: 082 651 6995 

Media participation: The High Level Dialogue on 17 August will be held in hybrid format at Gender Links Cottages, Johannesburg. 
Register here.