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Despite the global conventions and frameworks that Ghana had signed on gender and women issues, government still has a long way to go to responding to the issues. Government and its agencies, the political parties and relevant public and private institutions should take the needed actions that would improve the low participation of women at all levels, Dr. Beatrix Allah Mensah, a women�s activist said on Wednesday. Speaking at a Public Forum on a Model Affirmative Action Policy on Women�s Participation in Political Decision �Making organised by Women in law and Development for Africa (WiLDAF) in Accra, she said from 1993 to 2008, there has been some achievement through the strong mobilization and advocacy role by women or gender-based civil society organisations. The main policy was to be backed by resource provision, institutional support, capacity building and implementation of actions considered critical to attain the goal of achieving gender equality, she said. Dr Mensah said the proposed policy in the short-medium term called for the strengthening of the Ministry of Women and Children�s Affairs (MOWAC) and its agencies with the needed technical, financial and logistical support. It would also prepare women adequately for public positions by supporting the development of a core training manual on leadership, among other things. On the long term strategies, she called for the consideration for electoral reforms and constitution amendment and the establishment of a Women�s Leadership Academy to identify young, promising and interested women for training to serve as a resource pool for future political and public positions. Programme Governance Officer of WiLDAF, Mr. Frank Bodza said women empowerment and their participation in politics started as far back as 1975 with a conference in Mexico and then at the Beijing Platform for Action in 1995. Ghana�s response to the action was the formation of the National Council for Women and Development (NCWD) and subsequently the establishment of MOWAC. In 2002, the New Patriotic Party increased the number of women participation to 50 per cent in the District Assemblies and upgraded the NCWD into a fully fledged ministry. The ruling National Democratic Congress, he said promised 40 per cent participation of women but unfortunately President John Evans Atta- Mills appointment presently fell short of the number. He noted that out of the 32 ambassadorial appointments, only seven are females and only four out of the 25 cabinet ministers are women. Mr. Bodza said only 15 of the 75 ministers of state were women, whilst out of the 166 Metropolitan and Municipal appointees only 11 were women. He said to bridge the gap, WiLDAF and its collaborators were spearheading the campaign for an affirmative action policy document that would ensure the various political commitments to increase women participation in politics. He said however the pledges had not being backed by government white paper. Mr. Bodza said in April WiLDAF presented a communiqu� to the president who assured them of a review, adoption and implementation of the document Cataloguing the genesis of WiLDAF, Ms. Bernice Sam, the National Programme Co-ordinator said it was established as non-governmental organisation in 1991 with headquarter in Zimbabwe and represented in 26 countries. In Ghana, WiLDAF came into being in 1993 and has championed the cause of women empowerment in the country.