Elections
Women lack confidence, doubt their qualifications and wait to be asked, say pundits. The narrative directs attention away from the real culprits.
Men dominate Canadian politics. In the 2021 federal election, men represented 57 per cent of candidates for the Liberal party, 67 per cent of Conservative candidates and 70 per cent of elected MPs.
Yet rarely do we hear about men’s political dominance. Instead, we hear about women’s absence. Women don’t run, the pundits say. Women lack confidence, doubt their qualifications and wait to be asked. Women must, as a 2019 House of Commons report concluded, be empowered to stand.
Click here to read the full article published by Toronto Star on 11 September 2022.
For the first time, Indonesia, dubbed the world’s third largest democracy, will hold the general elections — the presidential and legislative elections — and nationwide regional elections in the same year. Taking place in 2024, it will be perhaps one of the year’s biggest democratic events, which people across the globe will closely follow.
Indonesia has, since 1999, held six national elections and hundreds of local elections, where every vote counts, to choose the president, legislature members, governors, regents and mayors, in a relatively democratic manner. But in most cases, men have won public offices.
Despite making up almost half of the population, women have traditionally been underrepresented in elected positions, including in the House of Representatives – even after Indonesia introduced over a decade ago a minimum of 30 percent female legislative candidates for each political party contesting the elections.
Click here to read the full article published by The Jakarta Post on 29 August 2022.
Kuwaitis to head to the polls on September 29 to elect next parliament after National Assembly was dissolved in June.
Kuwait's Interior Ministry has received more than 115 registrations from candidates before polls to elect the next parliament after more than a year of political tension between the National Assembly and government.
The first day for registration on Monday closed with 107 male and eight female applicants across the five electoral districts.
Kuwaitis are expected to head to the polls on September 29 to elect its next parliament more than two years since they last cast their ballots after the National Assembly was dissolved in June.
Click here to read the full article published by The National on 30 August 2022.
Ahead of the 2023 general elections, the United Nations has called on the media to ensure that female politicians are granted the same access as their male counterparts.
This was made known by the representative of the United Nations Women, Ms Beatrice Eyong, at a programme held for media executives in Lagos .
The event tagged, “National dialogue with media executives on gender-sensitive reporting,” was organised by the UN Women in collaboration with Women Radio and focused mainly on how the media should report gender-sensitive issues by amplifying and prioritising women in the runup to the 2023 elections.
Click here to read the full article published by Punch on 3 September 2022.
Journalist Ali Vitali covered female presidential candidates in 2020. Now she reflects on what got in their way.
As coverage of the 2022 midterms continues, NBC News Capitol Hill Correspondent Ali Vitali is ready to see more women running for office and watch how candidates are going to address women’s issues, including childcare and access to abortion.
During the 2020 election cycle, Vitali was on the campaign trail covering candidates like Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar. It seemed like a remarkable year, one in which a woman finally had a chance to be elected as the president of the United States.
Click here to read the full article published by Poynter on 22 August 2022.
On 18 July the IPU Gender Partnership Group and the National Assembly of Nigeria held an online briefing on women’s political empowerment to promote women’s participation in parliament in view of the 2023 Nigerian elections. There were 20 participants, including men and women MPs from Nigeria, Benin, the United Arab Emirates and Uzbekistan, representatives from the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), civil society, government, academia and the electoral commission.
The IPU has supported the Nigerian National Assembly in the area of gender equality and women’s political participation since 2020. After the 2019 legislative elections, the Nigerian Senate elected 8 women (7.34%) out of 109 members and the House of Representatives elected only 13 women (3.61%) out of 360 members. These figures fall well below the global average of 26.1% of women in parliament, and the objective of gender parity.
Click here to read the full article published by The Inter-Parliamentary Union on 2 August 2022.