The inclusion of women in leadership has been pitched on relevance and essence, not equality and right as other advocates do.

According to Rev. Prof. Ivy Drafor-Amenyah, an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church of Ghana, “every man was brought up by a woman and every man needs the voice of a woman in their life.”

It seems to her most strange that men may object to the leadership of women. Because to her “if the woman can raise this child, help this child to develop their value system, lead this boy to know how to speak properly and then walk properly, then what changed when this man now grows up and now the women cannot have positions of leadership at the highest level in institutions? We need to take a second look at that,” she said.

Illustrating this point further on “A Walk with Jesus,” a Joy FM Christian family programme Sunday, she said, ”there are men today who are great men who feel totally disorganised when there is no woman around them.”

She added that leadership is not so much about position as it is about essence and relevance. She advanced that women in leadership should be viewed from this point. “Are the roles women play relevant?” she asked.

While at it, she posited that despite the alienation of women in leadership, their contribution behind the scenes is what has propelled their husbands, fathers, brothers to places of influence.  

Drafor-Amenyah argued further that scriptures such as first Timothy chapter three verse twelve which appear to restrict women leadership has mostly been taken out of context. According to her in most of such instances, the writer only addressed specific concerns of a specific group in time. She has called for such scriptures to be looked at in “the holistic Christians acceptable doctrine.”

“Maybe some women were behaving disorderly and embarrassing their families. The advice is that they behave properly so that there is order in the church.  So it is about serving in the context of beauty and acceptable behavior” she said

According to the Presbyterian Minister of God, scriptures on appropriate conduct in church and out of church abound for all the gender.

She advanced that God and scriptures never intended for women to be excluded from leadership. In her view, that explains why the anointing of God is not restricted to one Gender. She quoted Joel 2:28 to support her point.

“In the last day’s He [God] will pour out his spirit on all flesh, not men. And both men and women will receive that anointing. God does not waste his anointing. He was not thinking of pouring the anointing on women so that they sit and warm the pews,” she said.

Drafor-Amenyah said women leadership is not the least about competing with men.

“Women do not need to behave like a man when they rise up to higher levels to be accepted or excel. You can maintain your womanhood and that is refreshing.”

According to her “to be a leader you need to be able to have a vision. You need to be able to communicate that vision effectively. You need to be able to rally the people around to move in line with that vision. You need to be able to motivate to inspire people. And women can do very well in all of these.”

She called for society to give women the opportunity to demonstrate what they have. According to her, men have nothing to lose or nothing to fear given that they are all partners in fulfilling God’s purpose and agenda.