élections

Lagos (AFP) - The two main candidates for the governorship of Nigeria's Lagos state took to the stage, making a flurry of promises to the all-female audience at the select Cosmopolitan Women's Club.

The men even pledged a 35 percent quota of women in the state government and initiatives on girls' education.

UNDP is recruting a Training Officer. This is a TA International contract (P3) for 11 months based in Antananarivo, Madagascar.

For more information and to apply, please click here.

Opposition challenger Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic has become the first female president of Croatia, winning by the narrowest of margins.

She secured 50.5% of the vote with 99% of ballots counted, while incumbent Ivo Josipovic was close behind on 49.5%.

Mr Josipovic has conceded defeat and congratulated his opponent.

The challenger's win is a sign that Croatia may be shifting to the right after the centre-left coalition's failure to end six years of downturn.

In a life spanning colonial rule, war, autocracy and revolution, Tunis resident Halima never saw a reason to vote.

A chance meeting in a souk earlier this month gave her one. She was introduced to Kalthoum Kannou, who has three children, a long marriage to a doctor, a 25-year career as a judge and an ambition to be the first female president of Tunisia.

USA marked a milestone in Tuesday's midterm elections with the victory of Democrat Alma Adams, who became the 100th female member of Congress, the highest number in history. 

President Dilma Rousseff has promised to re-unite Brazil after narrowly winning re-election to a second term in office with 51.6% of the vote.

She said "dialogue" would be her top priority after a bitterly fought campaign against centre-right candidate Aecio Neves, who got 48.4% of the vote.

The left-wing leader said she wanted to be "a much better president than I have been until now".

Tunisia, despite being the most advanced Arab nation in terms of women's rights, is still fare from adhering fully to the principles enshrined in the January 2014 Constitution and from abiding by the ratification of international treaties in daily life. Though 47% of candidates for Tunisia's parliamentary elections scheduled for Sunday are women, only 12% of them are on top of the electoral lists of candidates. This is a slight improvement on the previous elections, when the figure was 7%, but still shows a lack of equal opportunities for women.