Political Participation & Leadership

It has been argued that where women are fully represented, societies are more peaceful and stable. Women's political participation is fundamental for gender equality and their representation in positions of leadership must be a priority for all African governments. Women are largely under-represented in decision-making and leadership positions in Africa.

Over the last years, there has been more women in parliaments and decision-making positions than before. In the parliamentary elections of Rwanda in September 2013 women obtained 64 percent of the seats, which is the highest number in the world. However, women's participation in governmance and decision-making remain very limited. They are outnumbered by men in all decision-making and leadership positions.

In the history of Africa, there are now three women who have been elected president:

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf – President of the Republic of Liberia
Joyce Banda – President of the Republic of Malawi
Catherine Samba-Panza – Interim President of the Central African Republic

There is progress here and there on the continent regarding women's rights . We must go much further to ensure greater gender equality in Africa. It is not just a matter of justice....When women take their rightful place at the negotiating table, in the parliament and in leadership positions across society, we can unleash Africa’s enormous potential..." UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon

To learn more about women's political participation, please visit the following websites:

Source: All Africa
Female parliamentarians have met with women representatives from districts to discuss how to improve the welfare of women.

Rwanda

Source: All Africa
Women in southern Africa will soon move a step closer to having equal rights and opportunities with men when a regional gender protocol is ratified in the coming weeks.

South Africa

Source: allAfrica
Albertina Sisulu, who died in Johannesburg on Thursday at the age of 92, had little interest in politics when she met Walter Sisulu, future general secretary of the ANC. But she plunged wholeheartedly into the liberation struggle and emerged from years of detention, bannings and arrests as a major political figure in her own right.

South Africa

Source: All Africa
The hullabaloo about councillors with challenges in taking oaths of office in English reminds me of Mr Adeel, a technician I met in Khartoum 29 years ago.

Uganda

Uganda

Source: All Africa
WOMEN are big winners in the cabinet appointed on Friday. The number of women ministers rose from 16 in the last cabinet to 22 in the new one.

Uganda

Source: Third World Network
For Egyptian women, the decision to fully participate in the mass demonstrations that toppled Mubarak was also a decision to take back their streets - the very streets where sexual harassment and stalking were rampant.

Egypt

Source: Third World Network
To appease 'Arab spring' protesters, Algeria lifted a 1991 law that banned public assembly, but a longstanding women's vigil for the country's 'disappeared' complains it doesn't help them. Other political women debate the effects.

Algeria

Source: All Africa
Mirriam Kauseni is on a quest to become her town's first ever female parliamentarian. She has yet to be elected to run for the post by her party, the Patriotic Front (PF), but Kauseni has already been conducting door-to-door campaigns, telling people to vote for her in the country's national elections.

Zambia

Source: Reuters

Just two women sat among 17 men on a podium in Libya's eastern city of Benghazi this month when rebels paraded new members of their National Transitional Council to the media.

Libya

Source: All Africa
At independence in 1980 Loyce Tshuma (55), a villager in rural Tsholotsho in Matebeleland North, was a loyal believer in politics as a powerful vehicle to change and better lives. Since then she never missed an opportunity to cast her vote.