With primary season underway and a record number of women on ballots nationwide, the question now is how many will make it to office after elections in November. The reality is that many of the women running face long odds.

Of the 40 women who have advanced from primaries in Solid Republican districts, 37 of them are Democrats, and may have the odds stacked against them.

When a leftwing female congresswoman was described as too ugly to be raped, Manuela D’Avila’s stomach turned. The speaker was Jair Bolsonaro, the Brazilian far rightwing congressman and presidential candidate.

That feeling only worsened after the execution-style murder in March of Marielle Franco, a Rio de Janeiro councillor, a crime that many attribute to the fact that she was a black lesbian activist.

Liberia and Africa's first ever female president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has jetted in the country to engage the parliamentary women caucus and committee on gender equality, social development and family affairs on gender related issues. 

Sirleaf, who has been acclaimed as a major inspiration for women in politics in Namibia, has said she is here to listen so much as to speak on how Namibia has progressed on gender parity among other things.

Women in Africa are not generally found in leadership positions. Research shows that women are not perceived to have the skills, knowledge or social status needed to bring about meaningful change in post-conflict environments.

CAIRO — Egypt has yet to pass a law needed to hold local elections, but hundreds of women will not be wallflowers waiting for an invitation to run for office. Thanks to an initiative dubbed “The Councils Are Ours,” potential candidates will be prepared when the elections are finally held for the first time in eight years.

Just 35 women filed for one of the 125 Oklahoma legislative seats that were up for election in 2012.

This year, there will be nearly four times as many women running for the same number of seats. And following a trend across the nation, women will be better represented on the ballot than in at least a decade – and likely ever.