Maravi

Degree clause will disadvantage more women, says Inonge Wina

Degree clause will disadvantage more women, says Inonge Wina
By George Chellah
Fri 05 Feb. 2010, 04:00 CAT

THE degree clause will disadvantage more women, Inonge Wina said yesterday. Commenting on the National Constitutional Conference's recommendation that a presidential candidate must be a holder of a first degree, Wina, who is former Nalolo member of parliament, explained that the recommendation was not feasible.

“A degree holder clause for an aspiring president is not a feasible preposition in our country now, especially that the levels of higher academic achievement is still confined to a minority,” said Wina who is also Patriotic Front (PF) national chairperson.

“So in as much as I regard education especially higher education as a prerequisite for enhanced knowledge, you cannot make a better qualification a conditionality for presidency.”

She said the degree clause was discriminatory.

“It certainly defeats the whole democratic tenet of opening up chances for many Zambians to aspire for high positions in the governance of their country,” Wina said. “The clause is discriminatory and under the current political environment in our country, it looks as though the degree holder clause was meant to disadvantage some politicians and this will not work.

“And by the nature of such laws they always end up in failure because they are discriminatory, they penalise a group of people.”

She said this was not the time for the country to adopt such laws.

“The levels of literacy are very low and the levels of understanding and acceptance... The whole idea of confining the presidency to those who hold degrees is not possible,” said Wina. “I fear that more women will be disadvantaged because there are very few of them in universities particularly the University of Zambia (UNZA) and the other universities in the country.

“So at what point shall we have a woman president for this country if we had to base everything on university qualification? So that's why I consider this clause as discriminatory. It will definitely result in failure because it's discriminatory.”

Recently, the NCC unanimously recommended that a presidential candidate must be a holder of a first degree.

The delegates also resolved that members of parliament and councillors should have a minimum academic qualification of a grade twelve-school certificate.

Labels: INONGE WINA, NCC, PRESIDENCY

posted by MrK @ 5:17 PM