AFRICAN WOMEN LEADERS DEFY ODDS IN PATRIACHAL SOCIETY

African women leaders are claiming their leadership positions not only in Africa but at an international level; a good case in point is the appointment of former South African Vice President, Ms. Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka as the new Executive Director UN Women, the organization leading UN's work on advancing gender equality and women's rights in July 2013.

For Uganda’s case, the Rt. Hon. Speaker of Parliament of Uganda Rebecca Alitwala Kadaga was in September 2013 elected chairperson the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians-International (CWP), a seat she will hold for the next three years.  Kadaga was before then chairing the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians-Africa branch and is the first Woman Speaker of the Parliament of Uganda. Serving as the Speaker, Kadaga has overtime distinguished herself and partially redeemed the credibility of the Office of the Speaker of the Parliament of Uganda and portrayed herself as potential leader and for many ‘President Material’.

With leaders like Kadaga in Office and the increased numbers of women in leadership, one can say Uganda has achieved the critical mass widely regarded as sufficient for women to have direct impact, for example, towards gender sensitive legislation and policies that positively impact on women’s lives, in all their diversity. It’s worth noting that the presence of women has expanded and relatively deepened public concerns and brought new questions on the political agenda. Increased debates around health and water provisioning, gender based violence as well as education for the girl child can be partly attributed to women’s presence in the legislature and other key spaces.

This doesn’t go without challenges however. A recent study published study by the Daily Monitor which focused on the first and second sessions of the current 9th Parliament, which ran from May 2011 to May 2013 revealed that only 50 female MPs out of 134 women MPs had spoken two times in Parliament, an indication that less than 60 women legislators are vocal and can contribute to meaningful House debates.

In trying to analyse this analogy, some female legislators came in defense of their performance. One female MP stated that lack of awareness about gender issues has remained a big issue but also sometimes some MPs just keep quite. They lack the skills to articulate issues; the other big challenge especially for Ugandan politics is the women trying to toe party positions. It is a few NRM MPs who will for example stand up against party lines yet the opposition legislators’ debate without being threatened or intimidated.” In this study, fifteen MPs; six of whom are opposition and nine NRM, had exhibited excellent debating skills and emerged among the top cream. These included legislators from direct constituencies such as Ms. Betty Amongi (Oyam South) and Ms. Kabakumba Matsiko (Bujenje), Ms. Amongi also chair the Uganda Women.

But why are these the numbers few?

With the Affirmative action in place, the Uganda constitution allows for one female MP per district which has given women the opportunity to be voted for in Parliament. Although we have seen the number of women MPs escalating, the quality of the women being elected in to power is still up for debate. Additionally, Uganda is still battling with the issue of women preferring to stand on affirmative seats than on the mainstream even when they have greater chances of being elected into power on grounds that they are pro-poor and pro-development. This is barring the country from claiming the achievement of effective women’s participation.

This study helped confirm the fact that as we examine the successes realized by African women in leadership spaces, it’s worth noting that the financial, social, and cultural obstacles to women’s participation must be tackled before women can increasingly occupy more national and international leadership positions. In this way we can see women taking on even greater mantles than never imagined before.

There should be a deliberate effort to support women to contest mainstream seats, not only to expand the opportunities for women generally, but also to get the voting population to engage with their own prejudices particularly the preference male candidates. Even when women do not win in great numbers, the very point of competing on the mainstream seats gets society to engage, thereby pushing the boundaries for women’s political participation. Research especially by the School of Women and Gender Studies at Makerere University indicate that prejudices against women are slowly being dented.