- Advocating for openness, transparency, equality and accountability in feminist-led institutions and organizations.
- Affirming that being a feminist institution is not incompatible with being professional, efficient, disciplined, and accountable.
- Insisting on and supporting African womxn’s labor rights, including egalitarian governance, fair and equal remuneration and maternity policies.
- Using power and authority responsibly, and managing institutional hierarchies with respect for all concerned. We believe that feminist spaces are created to empower and uplift Womxn. At no time should we allow our institutional spaces to degenerate into sites of oppression and undermining of other Womxn.
- Exercising responsible leadership and management of organizations whether in a paid or unpaid capacity and striving to uphold critical feminist values and principles at all times.
- Exercising accountable leadership in feminist organizations taking into consideration the needs of others for self-fulfillment and professional development. This includes creating spaces for power-sharing across generations.
- Creating and sustaining feminist organizations to foster womxn’s leadership. Womxn’s organizations and networks should be led and managed by Womxn. It is a contradiction of feminist leadership principles to have men leading, managing, and being spokespersons for womxn’s organizations.
- Feminist organizations as models of good practice in the community of civil society organizations, ensuring that the financial and material resources mobilized in the name of African Womxn are put to the service of African Womxn and not diverted to serve personal interests. Systems and structures with appropriate Codes of Conduct to prevent corruption and fraud, and to manage disputes and complaints fairly, are the means of ensuring institutionalization within our organizations.
- Striving to inform our activism with theoretical analysis and to connect the practice of activism to our theoretical understanding of African feminism.
- Being open to critically assessing our impact as feminist organizations, and being honest and proactive regarding our role in the movement.
- Opposing the subversion and/or hijacking of autonomous feminist spaces to serve right-wing, conservative agendas.
- Ensuring that feminist non-governmental or mass organizations are created in response to real needs expressed by women that need to be met, and not to serve selfish interests, and unaccountable income-generating.
Lets Be Tested Queens
Abides by the African Feminists Charter on institutional ethics that subjects us to commit to the following:
