Elections

MJ Hegar does not hold back. "I'm an ass kicking, motorcycle-riding, Texas Democrat. That's who I am!"

She says that emphatically, unblinkingly and unapologetically to a constituent at a political meet-and-greet in a suburban Austin, Texas, home. And she is talking to someone she needs to win over.

“When a woman enters politics, it changes her. When many women do, it is politics that changes.” So said Florentina Gómez Miranda, a former Argentine congresswoman. Despite its macho reputation, or perhaps because of it, Latin America is unusually keen on quotas for female political candidates. In 1991 Argentina became the world’s first country to require parties to nominate women in a minimum fraction of races. Today, of the 18 Spanish- or Portuguese-speaking countries in the Americas, 17 have a version of this policy.

Efforts at encouraging strong women representation in active politics received a major boost as nine women filed their forms to contest for various positions in the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the Central Region.

Seven out of the number were candidates contesting the election for the first time with two incumbent women seeking re-election.

Statement by Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, UN Under-Secretary-General and UN Women Executive Director

Date: Thursday, July 26, 2018

A breast cancer survivor and trade unionist, a liberation war icon, an author and entrepreneur and a fashion designer are four women who have already made history by contesting Zimbabwe’s presidential elections, a first for women.

They are also on the verge of shattering many more records should any one of them beat the odds stacked against them to win the presidential election.

Mexico's hard swing to the left in this month's national elections also swept in some other historic firsts. Women won key positions across the country, including, for the first time ever, the mayor of Mexico City.

Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo, 56, will assume arguably the second most important political post in Mexico, after capturing nearly 50 percent of the vote in the July 1 elections.

First Donald Trump inspired Katie Muth to tell her husband about her rape, then he galvanized her into running for office.

Muth had been married for about five years, but never told her husband about the man she says raped her after the rehearsal dinner of a wedding years before they met.

Ghana is set to have a new head for its elections body, the Electoral Commission (EC). The nomination of Mrs. Jean Mensa as the new EC boss was announced by the presidency on Monday.

She will become the second successive woman to hold the post and will take over from Charlotte Osei – the first female occupant of the seat under the 1992 Republican consitution.