Two bodies to build capacities of female parliamentary aspirants

ABANTU for Development, a women-centred non-governmental organisation, in partnership with STAR-Ghana, is to help build the capacities of female parliamentary aspirants in the upcoming election.

Dubbed “Promoting gender responsiveness in election 2016 for equality and democratic governance”, the project is aimed at increasing women’s civic engagement and voice in promoting inclusive and democratic governance in the country.

A Senior Programme Manager of ABANTU for Development, Mrs Hamida Harrison, made this known at a roundtable discussion with journalists in Accra last Wednesday.

She lamented the fact that there were not enough resources for civil society organisations (CSOs) to build the capacities of the female aspirants, and added that it was because Ghana was presently a middle-income country and, therefore, was not getting the needed support from donor partners.

Lack of support

Also, she attributed the lack of support to increase the capacity of women aspirants to donor fatigue and said the government was also not doing anything to help in building the capacity of the female aspirants.

According to her, there was the need to build the capacities of the women aspirants so that they would be able to take up the task that was ahead of them.

Mrs Harrison also mentioned critical gaps and challenges, including the need to ensure women’s equal participation and leadership in decision making towards gender parity, to help promote peace, democratic governance and sustainable development, and added that failure to promote equality could give rise to destructive tendencies that could negatively affect the stimulation of real development.

Women in Parliament

In the First Republic, Dr Kwame Nkrumah introduced an affirmative action to bring in the Representation of the People’s Amendment Bill after he realised that the country’s parliament was made up of only men. Through that action, 10 women were elected into Ghana’s Parliament.

Mrs Harrison said the situation was worrying as the number of women in parliament continued to hover around 10 per cent.

To this end, she said the ABANTU-STAR-Ghana project would be used in developing a gender scorecard to serve as a tracking tool for evaluating political party practices for accountability, gender responsiveness and women’s rights.

She said it would also help in building the capacities and effectiveness of the female aspirants towards the promotion of accepted principles of equity and fairness in their bid to participate in the electoral process.

She said the project would also be used in strengthening the capacities of existing gender platforms and networks to increase their advocacy on peace, equality and democratic governance.

• Writer's email: rebecca.quaicoe-duho@graphic.com.gh