Gender inequality a challenge in councils

Leinanyana Tsiane | Tuesday March 25, 2014 14:59

Among other things, the Gantsi summit was to identify gaps and recommendations for post 2015 and share best practices on mainstreaming gender in service delivery within the councils.

According to the deputy executive secretary of BALA Ludo Matshameko, the summit was meant to come up with measures to close the gap between men and women representation at  council level. She said the gap has seriously widened after this year’s primary elections as many women from across party lines lost.

Despite these setbacks, Matshemeko noted that unlike in the past where politics was the domain of  men, more women are getting actively involved.   But it is still not enough as in contest, women still struggle for acceptance.

Matshameko said in most councils, 50 percent of women councillors are nominated and in most cases they are professionals who are expected to bring their expertise but their voices are not heard as they tend to shy away from debates.

Matshameko also observed that some women civic leaders are not well informed about topics discussed in councils because they do not research and are not aware of events around them and across the globe. In all the councils there are 604 councillors and only 161 are women.

This, noted Matshameko, calls for a gender action plan with governance so that political parties can increase women representatives’ numbers. Currently no councils have a budget for gender activities and this makes it difficult for gender committees to be able to host events with little or no resources at all.

BALA programmes officer Moemedi Tsimanyane insisted that municipalities are doing well in gender issues but that the problem is that they fail to evaluate their activities so as to map their interventions.

He said some councils lack innovation and do not think outside the box to come up with remedies especially with issues like gender based violence which is still rampant in some areas.

He further noted that gender issues should not be relegated to women only and commended those councils who have men actively involved in gender issues.

Tsimanyane said the Gender Action Plan for the 27 councils  and sub-districts should outline what councils will be doing in terms of gender issues though he too acknowledged that it is about time that councils have a gender budget.

Tsimanyane also noted that gender based violence affects all, therefore men and women should stand up and fight this social ill.