Elections

In our pursuit of gender equality, the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) is committed to exposing the hurdles faced by women in local and regional politics. Our recently released report, “Women in Politics,” provides a visual snapshot of women’s representation in elected roles across subnational levels.

Earlier this year, the IPU announced that around 70 elections were slated to take place in 2024, in what has been dubbed a super election year. In total, thousands of parliamentary seats are up for grabs. As of March 2024, women’s representation in parliament stands at just 26.9%. There was some progress in 2023 – 0.4 percentage points year on year, but progress has slowed compared to previous years.

In a parliamentary democracy like Namibia, all power shall be vested in the people through freely elected representatives exercising this power.

Some 51 % of Namibia’s population are women who still face many injustices based on their gender.

Namibia has a long history of many types of social inequality, including gender inequality.

The Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN), a coalition of non-governmental organizations that promotes democratic elections has called for more youth participation and representation in Zimbabwe’s electoral and governance processes, citing the low number of young lawmakers in the country’s parliament.

TOKYO -- Two strong, prominent female leaders have found themselves facing very different political futures in neighboring countries on the Bay of Bengal.

A Step Forward but Not Enough

In the 2019 general election, Indonesians elected more women into the national parliament than ever before, with women’s representation rising to 20.9%. This increase was attributed to the implementation of a 30% candidate quota for women, which compelled political parties to nominate more women candidates. However, this quota did not lead to equal representation, as more than 20% of electoral districts did not elect any women to parliament.

Jakarta (ANTARA) - As Indonesia will hold the 2024 General Elections on February 14, 2024, efforts to support women's representation in politics are still needed.

The Global Gender Gap Index 2022 released by the World Economic Forum ranked Indonesia in the 92nd position out of 146 countries, with a score of 0.697.

At first, they thought they would be the ones preparing themselves for political positions in Mexico: “a feminist party,” they mused. But then, they realized that wasn’t their purpose. They came to the conclusion that, although they care deeply about the way politics are done in their country, they didn’t personally want to step into those roles.