Swaziland LAWA Fellow 2003-2004 L.L.B., University of Swaziland, Post-Graduate Diploma in Women's Law, University of Zimbabwe, L.L.M., Georgetown University Law Center Private Bag X36 Hatfield, Pretoria 0028 South Africa Email:Phumzile.dlamini@wkkf.org Tel: (+27) 12 366 7600 Permanent: P.O. Box 481 Siteki, Swaziland Email:Phumzile2071@yahoo.com

Affiliations: Swaziland Action Group Against Violence (SWAGAA) Law Society of Swaziland Women in Law & Development in Africa (WiLDAf)

Profile:

Phumzile Dlamini is currently a Program Manager for the W.K. Kellogg Foundation Africa Program in the Pretoria, South Africa. She works in support and collaboration with senior program staff in carrying out the strategic programming functions of the Foundation. With a focus on helping to coordinate 10 integrated community development sites, and to install the theme of economic opportunity across the region, she acts as a key resource in the compilation, organization, utilization, and communication of information and knowledge, serves as an internal and external liaison/coordinator with ongoing programming efforts, and provides technical support to grantees and colleagues in a variety of programming efforts.

Before joining the W.K. Kellogg Foundation Ms Dlamini worked for the Coordinating Assembly of Non-Governmental Organisations (CANGO) as a Gender Coordinator under the Civil Society Capacity Building Project, a project whose major objective was building the capacity of civil society to effectively influence policy in Swaziland. Her responsibilities as Gender Coordinator were ensuring that gender was mainstreamed into all levels of policy advocacy that CANGO undertook or facilitated.

Ms. Dlamini completed her graduate paper, “The Draft Constitution of Swaziland: Its Compliance with International Standards & Its Effectiveness in Addressing Gender Inequality in Marriage” in 2004. For her fellowship internship she worked with the Washington, D.C. office of Global Rights.

Ms. Dlamini noted that, “The leadership training offered throughout the LAWA fellowship has continued to provide a sound leadership background throughout my career and my personal life. Seminars and resources gathered in Professor Sue Ross’s Comparative Women’s Rights course are to date a highly valuable resource in the promotion of the rights of women under the newly adopted Constitution. Nothing compares to networking with women’s rights promoters from different parts of the globe, which experience enriches one’s own context in a way that one would never have imagined.”

Additionally, she reported that a group of women’s rights lawyers from Georgetown Law Center and Swaziland are presently in the process of “opening up space” for test case litigation that will hopefully go a long way in translating the rights enshrined in the Swaziland Constitution into substantive rights for women in Swaziland.

Prior to LAWA, Ms. Dlamini was head of the Justice, Peace and Reconciliation Department with the Council of Swaziland Churches. From 2000-2001, she served as a candidate attorney for LKM Attorneys & Consultants. She acted as a Coordinator of the “Vote for a Woman” campaign for Leadership Regional Network (LeaRN) from 2002-2003. Ms. Dlamini is a founding member of Concerned Women of Swaziland, which initiated and developed the Human Rights and Constitution Awareness Program to prepare women of Swaziland to participate in the Constitution-making process.