Papua New Guinea

The plan to have five regional seats reserved for women beginning in the general election this year has been shelved, a senior government official told a parliamentary committee yesterday.

Ivan Pomaleu, the secretary to the Department of Prime Minister and National Executive Council, told the committee looking into gender-based violence, that Cabinet on Dec 15 last year directed some State agencies to deliberate on the matter.

In many parts of Papua New Guinea, fear of violence and harassment has caused a set back to the lives and small businesses of many women, but new candidates who now intend to enter politics aim to change this for the better.

“People within the community have approached me to stand for election - to revive the work and services my father had supported,” explains a local female candidate intending to enter politics.

Papua New Guinea (PNG) is one of only five countries in the world that have no female members of Parliament (alongside Yemen, Qatar, Micronesia, Vanuatu) and is below the global average of 23% female representation in Parliament.

According to the United Nations Development Programme, PNG, for the first time in 25 years (since the 1992 election), no females will make up the 111 - member Parliament - despite more female candidates being nominated for elections in 2017 than ever before; 167 of 3,332 were female candidates.

Hardworking, audacious, occasionally controversial, but always vivacious: one of Papua New Guinea’s political pioneers, Nahau Rooney, has been remembered as a trailblazer for PNG women in power following her death on 15 September, aged 75.

In 1977, Rooney was one of just three women elected to PNG’s first post-independence parliament – out of 109 members – where she represented the electorate of Manus.

A 29 year old has become just the second woman to win an open seat in the Bougainville parliament.

Theonila Roka Matbob's Ioro constituency in central Bougainville includes the Panguna mine within its boundaries.

The university graduate, who is a relative of Bougainville's first president, Joseph Kabui, beat 15 men to win the seat.

The Post Courier reports her saying after university she ran a child care centre in her Enamira village to see if she could work with people and run a facility without funding support.