Embarrassing gender imbalance
Embarrassing gender imbalanceBy Editor
Saturday February 16, 2008 [03:00]
It is sad that after all these years of campaigning for increased women participation and representation in the politics of our country only one female, out of six candidates, is fielded in the Kanyama parliamentary by-election.
This matter of women representation is very important, and it cannot be denied that the number of women members of parliament is painfully low, especially if one considers that women make up more than half of our country’s population. And why should this be so when women have a high degree of those qualities deemed necessary in a political leader?
Stated simply, we have not made sufficient progress in this area. This is a reality we must recognise so that we can all struggle against it.
In order to build a great democratic society, it is of utmost importance to arouse the broad masses of women to join politics and take up the political leadership of our country. Genuine equality between men and women can only be realised if there is equal participation and equitable representation between men and women in all our political institutions.
Women need to increase their political activity to improve their economic and political status. We will not make much progress as a nation unless we stop the political marginalisation of women.
Women must not be treated as mere passive participants in national development. But they must be helped to take up leading positions in the key institutions of the state. Women are not only a backbone of our families but they also play a major role in our economy, especially in rural areas.
it is therefore necessary to truly empower our women to enable them to participate in decision-making processes in our country. We say this because women bring special gifts to the progress of our country. If they are not listened to and are marginalised, then we simply will not have sustainable and equitable progress.
And to make progress on this score, men should be more involved in promoting women’s meaningful participation in the politics of our country. Advancement will not go very far unless women are enabled to take up key positions in our Parliament, Judiciary and Executive.
Women must be represented at decision-making levels in both economics and politics, to sustainably achieve development goals. Our political parties must make great effort to adopt women to contest parliamentary elections and not perpetually just use them to campaign for men.
We know men politicians are in the habit of talking to women as if there were no issues affecting women. “The fact is,” they say, “the home is the place for women. Their interests are in the rearing and training of children.
These are the things that interest women. Politics have nothing to do with these things, and therefore politics do not concern women.” Yet the laws decide how women are to live in marriage, how their children are to be trained and educated, and what the future of their children is to be.
All these things are decided by politicians doing politics in Parliament as members of parliament, passing laws, Acts of Parliament.
Men make so many laws that affect or concern women. And if women had a chance to direct the affairs of our Parliament, some of the laws that marginalise them today would not be there.
If women had equal political participation with men and were fairly represented in Parliament and other political institutions, we would have equitable laws in everything. If women had some share in the making of laws, they would have found a way of making all the laws fair, just and equitable.
There would be profound equality of all – equality in suffering and in hope.
It is said that woman is the procreator of humankind. But she is the creator of humanity – of humanness and humaneness – as well, in a specific manner of her own: in the delicacy of her service, her limitless self-donation, her affective and effective contact with the people, and that compassion of hers that will simply not rationalise the suffering of the poor. Woman is the creator of courage that will never abandon the suffering.
We see women’s effective and meaningful political participation as decisive to the building of a more just, fair and humane society because of the virtues women bring to that process: generosity, steadfastness, openness to universal love, courage, capacity to endure suffering, forgiveness.
Therefore, there is need to broaden our understanding of women’s situation in our socio-economic and political realities. We need to deepen our commitment and solidarity work toward full humanity for all.
The marginalisation of women is affirmed as a hard and abiding reality of life in our country.
Our women have an irreplaceable role in the affairs of our country, yet their contribution is not acknowledged, nor are they accorded equal opportunities with their male counterparts to participate in the governance of our country. This marginalisation is felt in all sectors of life: economic, social, cultural, political, sexual, religious and even within the family itself.
We are aware that the political empowerment of women is part and parcel of the political empowerment of all the poor in our country. There is need for a total rapture with the prevailing patriarchal system in order to build an egalitarian society.
The women’s struggle is deeply connected with the efforts of all the poor who are struggling for their upliftment in all aspects of life.
A mechanism must be put in place to ensure that not less than 50 per cent of our members of parliament are women.
And our political parties have to take affirmative action measures to achieve not less than 50 per cent representation by women in all their structures. This is not a pipe dream.
We may be accused of dreaming but there is nothing wrong with dreaming. After all we all know that today’s reality were yesterday’s dreams. If this is the case, why shouldn’t today’s dreams be tomorrow’s reality? The African National Congress in South Africa has shown us that this is achievable.
Not less than 50 per cent of its national executive committee are women. This has not been achieved by accident but by design. This is a good deed that we need to emulate.
Let us avoid the gender imbalance embarrassment of the Kanyama parliamentary by-election in future elections. There is nothing difficult about it; all we need is to see sense in the need to do so.
Labels: BY-ELECTIONS, NGOCC, WOMEN
posted by MrK @ 4:01 AM
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