Women's Leadership
In Togo’s rural communities, women bear much of the family responsibilities. However, they remain committed to their communities’ development despite the socio-cultural pressures.
Several rural areas in the Kara region of northern Togo have poor infrastructure, affecting the communities in Bassar and the Kabye, Lamba, and Konkomba people. The roads are often impassable, and waterways hamper hospital access, posing significant healthcare challenges. The women working as community health workers must combine their professional and family responsibilities to provide essential care for their communities.
In Togo, women account for more than 51.3 percent of the population of over 9 million. The illiteracy rate is 33 percent for men and almost double that for women.
Women-specific challenges in rural communities
In traditional Togolese culture, gender stereotypes are still prevalent, often preventing women from standing up for themselves and making independent decisions.
Agriculture is the primary industry in rural areas. It employs 80 percent of the female working population in subsistence farming, helping them provide for their families and meet their everyday needs. However, only 15 percent hold land titles. This limited access to land ownership and agricultural credits makes them dependent on men for resources and decision-making. Many women often suffer discrimination and economic violence, which, according to a demographic study, is sometimes compounded by physical violence. Reports indicate that as many as 32 percent of Togolese women have been victims of physical or sexual abuse from the age of 15.
Full article available here.
The end of the oppressive Assad regime in Syria in late 2024 has been broadly welcomed on the global stage – underscored by the fact the United States and European Union have now lifted sanctions against the country.
However, women have been marginalised by Syria’s new leadership. That’s a problem for Syrian women, of course, but it also puts at risk prospects for sustainable peace in Syria.
A growing body of research, including our own, shows a direct correlation between gender equality and peace.
Syria now stands at a crossroads. Will it ensure women’s meaningful participation and follow a path to peace? Or will things head in the other direction?
This is more urgent than ever. Failure to grapple with women’s rights in Syria risks plunging the nation further into extremist violence.
Full article published here.
The First Lady, Oluremi Tinubu, has said that allocating special seats to women in state and federal parliaments is not an act of charity but a way of strengthening the country’s democracy.
Tinubu made this statement on Wednesday at an interactive session on the special seat bill for women during the 2025 Open National Assembly Week, organised by the House of Representatives in Abuja.
Represented by the Chairman of the House Committee on Women Affairs, Kafilat Ogbara, the First Lady commended the 10th House of Representatives for pushing the reservation of special seats for women in both the states and the National Assembly.
She pledged to continue supporting interventions that promote women’s political empowerment, education, and economic inclusion, urging legislators to demonstrate official eagerness to ease the passage of the bill.
She said, “This event comes at a very important time in our nation’s history, as the National Assembly is currently conducting public hearings across the country on key constitutional and legislative reforms.
Full article available here.
Just four years ago, a woman in Afghanistan could technically decide to run for President, attend university, or play sports.
Today, none of that is possible. Even before the Taliban took power in August 2021, Afghanistan ranked among the lowest countries in the world for gender equality. But there had been hard-won gains. Now, under the Taliban’s de facto rule, those gains have been erased and Afghanistan has become the world’s most severe women’s rights crisis.
Yet the fierce determination and resistance of Afghan women continues to burn – and inspire. Despite near-total restrictions on their lives, they still find ways to run businesses and work on the front lines as humanitarian workers, journalists and community leaders.
“Sometimes, I wonder how to remain hopeful in these dark circumstances,” says Fariba (name changed), who had just started a degree when universities were closed to women. “Nonetheless, I remain hopeful for the future and reassure myself that darkness will end soon, and women and girls in our society will once again access opportunities for work, education and their basic rights.”
Full article published here.
Women in Borno state have called on the state government to mandate the reservation of special portfolios both at the state and federal levels.
The women, under the aegis of Women Political Participation Working Group, made the demand in the late hours of Thursday during a Consultative meeting of Women Advocacy Groups in preparation for the Zonal Public Hearing on Review of the 1999 Constitution in Maiduguri, Borno state
The Chairperson of the Women Political Participation Working Group, Aisha Abubakar, while speaking, said the bill for seat reservation, which has been prepared, is set to be presented at the Zonal public hearing on constitutional review.
She said, “The bill is all about having a reserved seat for women so that women can contest favourably and confidently for seats.
“Initially, contesting with men is not easy because of reasons like political, social, economic and other factors. Now, if we have this reserve seat, it means they will be basically reserved for us to contest”.
While citing an instance, she said, “We have 27 LGAs in Borno state, and 28 members House of Assembly, so going forward there will be additional members.
“Those additions will be reserved for women. This will also include senatorial district, where we have three, so it is now going to be four, which means the additional one is for women.”
Read here the full article.
In the grand theatre of South Asian politics, where symbolism often overshadows substance, women’s political participation remains wrapped in layers of emotional performance and aesthetic design. Women’s representation in politics is packaged within strategic aesthetics; emotional narratives of motherhood, sacrifice, and campaign posters all contribute to a branded women’s representation in politics that distributes aesthetic meaning. This is more than branding; it is what is often casually termed in political and feminist discourse, increasingly “Pink Politics,” a curated image of progress appears progressive to an extent but ultimately reproduces the very limitations of traditional gender roles.
Read the full article here.
More than 100 years after women gained full citizenship rights through the 19th Amendment, women are still under-represented in government. While it is widely known that no woman has become president, it is not only the highest executive offices where women have not had access: women also face barriers at the state level.
Even in 2022, the vast majority of state cabinets are dominated by men. Cabinet members hold a vital position of power: running state agencies and serving as trusted advisors to the governor, helping them make important decisions. In nearly all states, most, if not all, cabinet members are appointed by the governor.
Click here to access the report.
Tunisia has seen a marked shift in attitudes towards women political leaders since Najla Bouden became the first female prime minister in the Arab world. However, this doesn't mean that life has dramatically improved for Tunisia's women, writes BBC News Arabic's Jessie Williams.
Bochra Belhaj Hmida has spent her whole life fighting for both gender equality and democracy in Tunisia - "one of which cannot be achieved without the other," she says.
After the revolution in 2011 - which saw her take part in the mass demonstrations that led to autocrat President Ben Ali being ousted - Tunisia passed a gender parity law. It requires political parties to have an equal number of men and women on their list of candidates to serve in parliament after elections.
It was around this time that Ms Belhaj Hmida joined a political party, Nidaa Tounes.
But being a woman in politics in Tunisia - and a woman fighting for equal rights - is not easy.
Click here to read the full article published by BBC on 12 July 2022.
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Women around the world are facing unprecedented levels of targeted political violence. This is also true in West Africa. Women can be targeted in a myriad of ways, by an array of types of perpetrators, during and outside of periods of conflict and contentious crises. The result though is consistent: such targeted violence has worrying implications for women’s political participation as well as their involvement in the public sphere. Political violence targeting women (PVTW) in West Africa has become increasingly common, with this trend increasing even more dramatically in recent years. The threat and risks, however, have not been uniform: different types of violence and different primary perpetrators dominate the gendered violence landscape across countries. Using data from ACLED, this paper tracks how women are targeted, and who is targeting women. Only by understanding how threats and risks that women face differ across countries can strategies be created to protect women.
Click here to access the report.
The overlapping impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, accelerating climate disasters, and geopolitical conflict are a threat to gender equality and women’s rights across the globe. This report from UN Women and UNDP shows what governments can do now to prevent further rollbacks and recover lost ground, while enhancing resilience and preparedness for future shocks.
Drawing on a unique global dataset of close to 5,000 measures adopted by 226 countries and territories in response to COVID-19, the report finds that, overall, government responses paid insufficient attention to gender dynamics. At the same time, instances of innovation and learning hold important lessons for gender-responsive policymaking in times of crisis.
For the first time, the report provides analysis on the factors that led to a strong gender response, generating key lessons for governments:
- In a context of growing threats to democratic and open societies, strong institutions proved critical for an inclusive gender response.
- Feminist movements and women’s rights organizations provided an early warning system on the gender impacts of the pandemic, particularly on violence against women and girls.
- Women’s representation and leadership in executive positions, parliaments, and public administration was critical for translating feminist advocacy into policy action.
- Countries with robust public services and gender-responsive social protection systems were in a better position to respond, while others had to improvise, under pressure, and with varying degrees of success.
- Digital tools sustained feminist activism online and enabled policy innovations and rapid support roll-out, reaching groups of women often left behind in “normal times”.
- Real-time gender data on the impact of the pandemic on women and girls was critical to making the case for gender-sensitive response measures, as was tracking what worked in government responses.
Click here to download the report.
Uganda adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and was one of the first countries to integrate them into its National Development Plan. Under Goal 5, countries commit to promoting and guaranteeing women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decision-making. This survey report is a follow-up of the baseline survey of women in local governments that was conducted by the Uganda Bureau of Statistics in 2017 and addresses three specific objectives:
1) To update and track progress towards attainment of gender parity in political representation at LG level;
2) To assess the extent to which women in LGs effectively contribute to local decision-making processes; and
3) To provide a deeper understanding of the factors that hinder elected women in LGs from effectively fulfilling their mandate.
The study was undertaken using Local Government (LG)’s election data from the Electoral Commission and survey data collected through key informant interviews with political leaders at the LG levels and focus group discussions with community people. The survey was conducted in Gulu, Nwoya, and Pader in the North; Napak, and Morotoin Karamoja sub-region; Pallisa and Bugiri in the East; and Kiryandongo in the West. Survey data was analysed using both quantitative (descriptive statistics) and qualitative techniques, which involved qualitative data from focus group discussions and open-ended survey responses from individual respondents was analysed through the following steps: transcribing the qualitative responses; pooling the transcribed responses from the various FGDs according to specific research questions; identifying the main ideas that occur in the answers to each question and creating themes; and writing narratives to describe the themes.
Click here to download the report.
Advancing Gender Equality in National Climate Plans: Progress and Higher Ambitions highlights the latest data on country progress in integrating gender considerations into their national climate plans, or Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), under the UNDP Climate Promise initiative. UNDP supports 120 countries through the Climate Promise to reach their climate goals as part of the Paris Agreement. The brief also explores how countries can scale up ambitions on gender integration in the NDC implementation process, as well as the challenges and opportunities that could arise as countries move from pledges to realizing these gender commitments.
Click here to access the report.