BY MENGESHA AMARE
Women have recently been receiving due attention in Ethiopia as the government has shown keen interest to help them come up with equal opportunity to partake in a multitude of political spheres.
Taking a comprehensive approach in democratic governance, spanning the entire political and electoral process and recognizing the fundamental importance of empowering women as voters, political actors and decision-makers is of paramount importance in building a democratic nation.
There is strong evidence that as more women are elected to office, there is also a corollary increase in policy making that emphasizes quality of life and reflects the priorities of families, women, and ethnic minorities, too.
Women’s political participation has profound positive and democratic impacts on the general public, administrations, political parties, and citizen’s lives, and helps democracy deliver as they are sympathetic in nature and most of the times have a gut to condemn irregular and immoral acts among the community from which they come.
Being a guest of honor, speaking at a graduation ceremony organized by Debretabor University in relation to graduating its students, Meaza Ashenafi, Supreme Court President stated that developing sense of belongingness in every area of engagement is instrumental in helping the country bring about real change centering women as engines of change.
She also said that gender equality is fundamental to responsive and accountable democratic societies. Women’s representation in elected institutions in equal proportion to men and their active engagement in all aspects is key to the credibility and legitimacy of parliaments, national assemblies and local governments.
“Around the world, women politicians are often perceived as more honest and more responsive than their male counterparts, qualities which encourage confidence in democratic and representative institutions. Their participation also bolsters the legitimacy of the governing body as it becomes more representative of the society it serves,” she added.
Since they have accounted for more than half percent of the population in Ethiopia, empowering women and girls is an incomparable means to build a democratic society and bring about a prosperous and well-off country.
As leant from Meaza, bringing together a broad spectrum of actors integral to achieving gender equality in elected office at both national and regional states levels is quite important in pushing the nation steps forward.
Elected representatives at federal and regions have established structures and strategic plans to improve women’s political participation and gender equality in a bid to combat discriminatory legislation and policies as well as improve gender equality outcomes in policymaking, she stated.
According to Meaza, the government has now highlighted the critical importance of gender equality and women’s participation in decision-making to sustainable development, and has called for the empowerment of women as voters, political actors and decision-makers.
“Male and female legislators must work together in order to solve the myriad of problems in the country. In order to meet national as well as continental development goals and build strong, sustainable democracy, women must be encouraged, empowered and supported in becoming strong political and community leaders,” Filsen Abdullahi, Women, Children and Youth Affairs Minister said.
The government is committed to empower women to discharge their respective responsibilities to back the overall development and growth of the nation.
Women are now coming to decision making posts in various areas under government structure such as president office, courts, electoral board, various ministries and other important sector offices as well as in the parliamentary institutions. This promising trend needs to be well consolidated and expanded to various subdivisions.
“Our work in various parts of the country has shown that strengthening gender equality, in a number of institutions and make their respective activities more inclusive, transparent and accountable,” she said.
According to Filsen, if a country is to bring about a comprehensive and remarkable development, women have to be given opportunities to beef up their political participation, upturn their socio-economic contribution as well as combine their efforts to scale up their capacity to deal with a range of ups and downs through own associations.
She said, “Women have long been marginalized from political, decision making and decisive socio-economic appointments. There are improvements these days, of course, as the government has worked hard to provide them with ample occasions to enjoy rights especially after the freeform.
For instance, women are putting themselves forward for elections more and more, yet their numbers are still far behind those of their counterparts. Even though it is widely accepted that development, peace and prosperity in societies cannot be achieved without half portion of the population, women continue to be sidelined in decision-making.
As stigma against women in politics and other socio-economic spheres is still alive, a lot has to be done to do away with the structural, socioeconomic, institutional and cultural barriers.”
As learnt from Filsen, tackling those barriers takes effort on the part of every element of society whether it is government, civil society organizations, the media, academia, the private sector, the general public, the youth and the likes.”
The fact that more women are willing to run for office is a positive step. Women represented by a woman are more interested and become more involved in politics and feel more skilled and effective than did those represented by a man, Filsen underscored.
Undeniably, the Ethiopian government is working on promoting women’s political participation at different levels and in different ways.
The effort exerted towards promoting women in public and political life has now become auspicious. The incumbent is creating civic space with the aim of amplifying the voices of women in politics, highlighting the successes that Ethiopian women have had and shedding light on the challenges they still face.
It is a platform for institutions that manage and administer elections, civil society organizations that advocate for and promote women’s political participation, and a range of organizations that support these efforts.
Along with increasing the quantity of elected representatives, parliamentary and regional gender equality groups have been playing a great role in empowering women through capacity building, awareness-raising and knowledge-development exercises.
“Gender equality is both a requirement for effective, responsive and accountable democratic societies and a means of increasing the credibility and legitimacy of designated institutions” Filsen added.
She further said that depending on whether women are young or older, educated or uned¬ucated, live in rural or urban areas, they have very dif¬ferent life experiences that lead to different priorities and needs.
As to Filsen, women’s representation is a critical factor for the development of comprehensive, reactive and see-through democracies thereby coming up with civic-minded, responsible and productive generation.
In general, the country has to establish governance structures, support mechanisms, and strategic plans to improve women’s political participation and gender equality. Of course, the government is now facilitating conditions for the creation of structures in many sector offices, supporting the emergence of well composed parliaments, and adopting gender-sensitive policies and legislative framework.
Yes, the equitable and full participation of women in various social, economic and political aspects is essential to building and sustaining strong, vibrant democracy. To make this a reality, the meaningful participation of women in national, local and community leadership has to be well acknowledged and given space as it could prettily be a pivotal input for national development policies and strategies.
The Ethiopian Herald February 3/2021
