Parliaments & Representatives
A staggering 89% of women social media users in Bangladesh have experienced online violence at least once, speakers said at a national consultation, calling for urgent coordinated action to tackle technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV).
Speaking at the programme titled "Prevention, Mitigation and Response for Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence in the Context of Digital Development: The Role of Technology Platforms" on Thursday, they stressed the need for stronger policies, greater accountability of tech platforms, and widespread awareness to prevent and respond to the growing threat amid rapid digital expansion, UNB reports. The consultation, organised by the Bangladesh NGOs Network for Radio and Communication (BNNRC) at the CIRDAP Auditorium in Dhaka, brought together policymakers, law enforcement officials, regulators, and development experts.
It was organised under the project titled "Strengthening Resilience Against Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence (TFGBV) and Promoting Digital Development." The project is implemented as part of the "Nagorikata: Civic Engagement Fund (CEF)" programme, funded by Switzerland, Global Affairs Canada, and the European Union, with technical assistance from GFA Consulting Group.
In March last year, soon after giving birth to her twins, Susan Kihika was subjected to a campaign of online abuse. Kihika, who is governor of Nakuru county in Kenya’s rift valley, was accused of abandoning her country because she took her maternity leave in the US after being treated there for a high-risk pregnancy.
The criticism quickly escalatedto attacks and sexist smears. Soon social media commenters were accusing her of sleeping her way into politics. Her location was shared.
Kihika’s deputy, David Kones, and the Kenya Women Parliamentary Association (Kewopa) defended her but the abuse continued, online and offline, calling for Kihika’s removal from office because she has dual Kenyan-US citizenship. Kewopa argued that the scrutiny Kihika faced reflected a double standard: male leaders are rarely criticised for taking time off for personal reasons.
It was not the first time Kihika had been subjected to sexist abuse. In 2018, when she divorced her first husband, she was criticised for choosing politics over monogamy. Twitter (now X) users demanded that she release nude photographs to show that she was not a man.
The Women’s Quota Act of 2023 has officially been implemented, marking a significant step towards increased representation of women in legislative bodies. This legislation aims to reserve 33 per cent of seats for women in the Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies, thereby promoting gender equality in political participation. The Act is a landmark development in addressing long-standing disparities in political representation across India.
Following extensive discussions and debates in Parliament, the Act was approved on March 29, 2023. The move is expected to encourage more women to engage in politics, facilitating their active involvement in decision-making processes. Proponents of the Act view it as a crucial measure for empowering women and ensuring their voices are adequately represented in the political arena.
To enforce the provisions of the Women’s Quota Act, the Election Commission of India will begin the process of delineating constituencies to accommodate the new seats reserved for women. The Commission is tasked with ensuring a transparent and fair allocation process, which is vital for the successful implementation of the Act.
The discourse surrounding the Women’s Reservation Bill, or Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, shows how masculine politics has weaponised women’s issues. It reduces longstanding debates about women’s political representation to symbolism rather than focusing on substantive empowerment.
This article argues that a persistent gap exists between rhetoric and real inclusion. Structural limitations of the state and party system have restricted women’s access to decision-making roles for decades. Despite nearly a century of advocacy by the women’s movement, the system has not ensured the equitable representation of women in power.
In response, this work calls for a rethinking of political representation, including the possibility of imagining alternative political formations such as women-led and women-centric platforms to eliminate entrenched exclusion. This work concludes that women’s political inclusion is not only about numbers but about strengthening their political agency by following the bubble-up approach. It reiterates that women’s rights are non-negotiable. While aiming for substantive justice by strengthening grassroots politics, it calls for eliminating patriarchy at all levels.
Each year on 8 March, International Women’s Day is marked with speeches, seminars, public pledges, and celebratory slogans. Government bodies, political leaders, and civil society organisations speak passionately about gender equality, empowerment, and progress. The day generates visibility and symbolic commitment. Yet when the ceremonies end, the urgency often fades, while the daily realities confronting women remain stubbornly unchanged.
This stark contrast between formal promises and lived experience raises a pressing question: beyond the rhetoric, how much genuine progress is being made for women’s rights and empowerment in Bangladesh.
Women’s socio-economic, cultural, and political empowerment remains one of the country’s most significant unfinished challenges. Over the years, Bangladesh has built an international reputation for supporting women’s development. It has constitutional guarantees of equality and is party to major global human rights agreements. On paper, this framework signals commitment. In practice, however, millions of women still navigate lives shaped by insecurity, exclusion, discrimination, and multiple forms of violence. The distance between legal recognition and everyday reality exposes a deep contradiction within the nation’s democratic and development journey (source: Constitution of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh).
THIMPHU – In 2016, when Kinley Zangmo first put her name forward for the Mangmi post in Talo Gewog, Punakha, many still whispered that politics was a man’s domain.
She was competing against three male candidates and stepping into a space she once believed was not meant for women. Yet when the ballots were counted, the villagers had chosen her.
The victory did more than hand her a seat; it reshaped her understanding of what was possible. Five years later, encouraged by the confidence she had earned and the trust she had built with voters, she contested again in 2021. This time, she said, she was not surprised by the outcome. She won.
For the 41-year-old, winning two consecutive terms represents more than personal milestones. “They signal a quiet shift in voter attitudes,” she said. “People are beginning to see that women are capable. But we have to prove ourselves when we are given the chance.”
While women make up more than half of Bhutan’s population, they are largely underrepresented in leadership positions. Yet, in recent years, women have become more visible in leadership roles, from local government positions to senior public appointments, suggesting that perceptions toward women in leadership may be gradually evolving.
In Ghana, the recent push for a gender equality bill is a crucial step toward enhancing women’s political representation. However, its effectiveness hinges on overcoming entrenched gender biases and ensuring robust implementation to truly transform the political landscape.
On 30 July, Ghana’s parliament passed the Affirmative Action (Gender Equality) Bill, ending a process that began in 1998. Despite women constituting the majority of Ghana’s population, they hold less than 15 percent of parliamentary seats and remain underrepresented in managerial roles, even though they represent a majority in the service sector. The passage of the bill represents remarkable progress towards enhancing gender equality and inclusivity in the country and thus rightfully deserves all the attention it has garnered.
Additionally, this legislative milestone is especially significant for a country that has consistently ranked low on the Global Gender Gap Index in recent times. For example, in 2021, Ghana ranked 117 out of 156 countries; in 2022, 108 out of 146 countries; and in 2023, 100 out of 146 countries. What are the potential challenges that could impede the successful implementation of the bill (when it becomes law), and what are the prospects for this legislation in advancing gender equality and inclusivity in Ghana?
Read here the full article published by the Australian Institute of International Affairs on 20 August 2024.
Image by Australian Institute of International Affairs
How Instagram is failing women and public officials
New research by CCDH shows that Instagram failed to act on 93% of the abusive comments targeting high-profile US women politicians we reported, including death and rape threats.
Meta’s Instagram is becoming a weapon in this assault, failing to step up to make its platform safer as the US election approaches.
CCDH reported 1,000 abusive comments targeting women politicians running for office in 2024 including:
Democrat: VP Kamala Harris, Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Jasmine Crockett, Nancy Pelosi and Senator Elizabeth Warren.
Republican: Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene, Maria Elvira Salazar, Anna Paulina Luna, Lauren Boebert and Senator Marsha Blackburn.
A week later, Instagram had taken no action against 926 of these hateful comments, which contained sexist and racist abuse, and death and rape threats.
An intro from CCDH CEO Imran Ahmed
Online spaces are now the primary places where societal norms and values are negotiated and normalized, and where we learn about and discuss current events, social issues, and politics. In 2024, with democracy hanging in the balance, social media platforms are under heightened scrutiny for their role in rising polarization, stoking division, and our increasingly toxic political environment. So how are they doing? In the case of Instagram, this report finds that they may as well not be trying at all. Abuse is endemic, and there is evidence they fail to act in over 9 in 10 instances even when alerted...
Read here the full report published by the Center for Countering Digital Hate on 14 August 2024.
Image by Center for Countering Digital Hate
The underrepresentation of Nigerian women in governance and politics has been a longstanding issue in political discourse.
Currently, women occupy only a small fraction of the seats in Nigeria’s National Assembly, with 3 out of 109 senators and 15 out of 360 members of the House of Representatives being female while, there are five appointed women ministers out of 45. Since gaining independence in 1960, Nigeria is yet to have a female president.
On the 9th of July the House of Representatives advanced a bill to its second reading, aiming to create 74 seats for women in the National Assembly.
The bill, sponsored by Deputy Speaker Benjamin Kalu and 12 others, proposes amendments to Sections 48, 49, 71, and 117 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) to establish “Special seat reserved exclusively for women in the Senate and House of Representatives for each state of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).”
The news stirred mixed emotions as the 9th National Assembly dismissed all 5 gender bills, leaving women perplexed about the obstacles they face in achieving equal representation to contribute their share to national development, akin to their male counterparts.
Read here the full article published by Radio Nigeria on 19 July 2024.
Image by Radio Nigeria
Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike, the first woman to lead Japan's capital, clinched a third term on Sunday to extend her time in office running one of the populous cities in the world.
Dozens of candidates were competing to unseat her, with female opposition lawmaker Renho Murata one of the main challengers — a rarity in Japan's male-dominated political scene.
In the country's 47 prefectures, only two governors are women. At the national level, the ratio is similar — only about 11% of members in the lower house of parliament are female. Japan does not currently have mandated gender quotas for politicians.
According to Mikiko Eto, a political science professor at Hosei University, such law would be "the most important point" to address the disbalance.
Have gender quotas worked?
Unlike Japan, many political systems around the world have implemented gender quotas to increase the number of women in politics.
In Taiwan, where there are reserved seats for women and candidate quotas in place, women now make up 41.6% of parliament — the highest percentage of female lawmakers in Asia.
In Indonesia, women's representation in parliament was quite low before the 30% candidate gender quota was introduced. In 1999, fewer than one in 10 lawmakers was female. Two decades later, that number had risen to one in five.
"In countries where women's descriptive representation is still very low, affirmative actions like gender quotas seem to be the first step to take," Nankyung Choi, a scholar who specializes in women and politics in Southeast Asia, told DW.
Read here the full article published by DW News on 10 July 2024.
Image by DW News
During the same period, it was also found that while women’s representation in top executive positions in government has increased, their presence in local government across Africa has declined. In East Africa, women's representation in local government declined by 11%, alongside a 16% increase in women holding top executive positions. The acknowledgment remains that progress in advancing meaningful political participation for women in Africa is still slow.
The WPP Barometer is a resource tool that demonstrates the status of women's political participation in Africa. It aims to provide evidence, particularly to legislators and policymakers, to advocate for and strengthen women's political participation and leadership.
On 10 July 2024, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA), through the Women in Political Participation Project, in collaboration with Gender Links, will mark a milestone by launching the second edition of the WPP Barometer.
The presentation of the WPP Barometer Topline findings follows the publication of the 1st Edition of the WPP Barometer in 2021, providing insights into the status of women's political participation in Africa. This event underscores the achievements of the Women in Political Participation Consortium, which was launched in 2019 with support from the Embassy of Sweden in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Through this initiative, the consortium is advancing the project titled "Enhancing the Participation of Women in Political Participation in Africa".
Central to the project's mission is the promotion of women's political participation and representation across Africa. Drawing inspiration from the Maputo Protocol of 2003, sub-regional protocols, and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the project aims to amplify the voices of women in political spheres.
To achieve its objectives, International IDEA and its partners engage with a diverse range of stakeholders, including political parties, media organizations, election management bodies, parliaments, and governmental ministries focused on gender and women's issues. By collaborating with policymakers and regional bodies such as the African Union and regional economic communities, the project aims to effect meaningful change throughout the continent. Currently operational in eight African countries—Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Eswatini, Côte d’Ivoire, Kenya, Senegal, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe—the Women in Political Participation (WPP) project is making significant strides towards its goals.
Click here to read and download the Women’s Political Participation: Africa Barometer 2024.
This article investigates legislators’ willingness to talk about gender and women during policy making discussions, asking whether it is conditional on their sex or partisanship in environments where party discipline does not constrain their speech. The Canadian Senate offers a case of a legislature with low or absent party discipline. A quantitative content analysis of nearly 1,000 Senate committee meetings confirms that sex is a primary indicator of legislators’ inclination to talk about gender and women. Moreover, women senators who sit on committees with a critical mass of women members (30% or greater) are more likely to talk about gender and women, making the case for the importance of women’s descriptive representation. Partisanship and independence had no significant effect on senators’ propensity to discuss women. The findings suggest that partisanship does not constrain legislators’ representation of women in environments with low party discipline.
Read here the full article published by the Cambridge University Press on 15 May 2024.
Image by Cambridge University Press