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Origins and Objectives of Pan-African Women’s Day

An African women's mobilization for Pan-African Women's Day

Presented by Comrade Debora Soares da Gama, A-APRP Pre-Cadre; militant of the Amilcar Cabral African Youth (JAAC) serving on its Secretariat for Zone 4 of Bissau; and Pre-Cadre of the PAIGC Amilcar Cabral Political Ideological Training School.

Origin of Pan-African Women’s Day

Pan-African Women’s Day was founded on 31 July 1962, Dar-es-Salaam (Tanganyika), following recommendations of the All African Women’s Conference (AAWC) – Conférence des femmes africaines (CFA). that took place in July 1961, in Conakry, People’s Revolutionary Republic of Guinea.

Prior to this conference, it was resolved to organize African Women’s Conferences each areas, (Liberation Movements and Independent African Countries) and meet in Dar-es-Salaam (Tanganyika) the following year in July 1962 to create a Pan-African Women’s Organization (PAWO).

It should be noted that the same process took place for youth and workers – i.e. – each area held national conferences to create national workers’ unions and national African youth organizations followed by African Continental Pan-Africanist Youth Organization and Pan-African Workers’ Union.

The Pan-African Women Organization (PAWO), the first continental women’s organization,  was created on 31 July 1962 in Dar es Salaam, Tanganyika (later changed to the United Republic of Tanzania when Tanganyika united with Zanzibar). It was inaugurated one year before the Organization of the African Unity (OAU) by the Heads of State and Government of independent African countries, former leaders of African liberation movements of that period and great African women leaders within our continent.

The participants came from 14 Liberation Movements (including the African Party of Independence of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde (PAIGC); the Democratic Party of Guinea of the African Democratic Revolution (PDG-RDA); the Convention People’s Party of Ghana (CPP); FLN-Algeria, etc…) and 10 Independent African Countries (including Guinea, Ghana, Mali, Egypt, Algeria, Tanzania, etc..).

The first Headquarters was in Bamako, Mali, from 1962 until the coup d’état against Modiba Keita and the US-RDA Government. It then transferred to Algiers, Algeria, followed by Luanda, Angola; Pretoria, South Africa and now Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

The first Secretary-General of PAWO was our Immortal Sister & Comrade Jeanne Martin Cisse of Guinea. (Note that she remained until she was nominated to the UN Security Council to serve as the first woman in the world and later President of the UN Security Council).

At the PAWO Congress in 1970, it institutionalized the 31st of July as Pan-African Women’s Day. It also decide to include the position of President, with Comrade Assetou Koité elected President until the most recent Congress of 2019.

Currently, the President of PAWO is Comrade Sister Eunice Lipinge, who also serves as the Secretary-General of SWAPO Women.

Grace Kabayo of Uganda serves as the Secretary General of PAWO. Both were unanimously elected at the 10th Congress held in Namibia in 2019.

Aims and Objectives of the Pan-African Women Organization

Join the All-African Women’s Revolutionary Union for Pan-African Women’s Day!

Join the All African Women’s Revolutionary Union – the women’s wing of the All African People’s Revolutionary Party – for an international Pan-African Women’s Day webinar featuring a panel of young revolutionary African women talking about the role of sisters and youth in the struggle to win Pan-Africanism in the 21st century. 

This webinar will be taking place on Saturday July 31st at 4 PM GMT and will be hosted via Zoom and streamed live to AAPRP social media platforms – Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube. Registration is required to participate via Zoom, register at this link: https://bit.ly/PAWD2021


For more information visit aaprp-intl.org


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The All-African People’s Revolutionary Party (AAPRP) is a permanent, independent, revolutionary, socialist, Pan-African Political Party based in Africa. Africa is the just homeland of African People all over the world. Our Party is an integral part of the Pan-African and World Socialist revolutionary movement.

The A-APRP understands that “all people of African descent, whether they live in North or South America, the Caribbean, or in any other part of the world, are Africans and belong to the African Nation”. — (Kwame Nkrumah, Class Struggle in Africa, page 4).

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