GENDER AND CONSTITUTIONAL RESPONSIBLILITIES OF MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT
The gender issue is much more than electing more women to Parliament. It affects all aspects of parliamentary life and each of the responsibilities of all Members, says the Speaker of Uganda’s Parliament.
Rt Hon. Rebecca A. Kadaga, MP, in
Kampala. Ms Kadaga, a lawyer, is the Speaker of the Parliament of Uganda having served as Deputy Speaker from 2001 to 2011. She is the Vice- Chairperson of the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians Steering Committee of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association and chairs the CWP’s African Region Steering Committee. She has served in the Ugandan Parliament since 1996, holding several ministerial portfolios. This article is based on a presentation to a Zambia post- election seminar in November 2011.
Members of Parliament are elected by the population which comprises both men and women. It is the expectation of the population that their aspirations, needs and desires are reflected in the agendas both of the political parities as well as of Parliament. It is therefore also necessary that both genders be represented in Parliament. This has its roots in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 which provides in Article 2:
“Everyone is entitled to all the rights, and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without discrimination of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status….”
Since then, several Human Rights Instruments have been promulgated in the United Nations, the African Union and other bodies.
294 | The Parliamentarian | 2011: Issue Four In 1975, the First World
Conference on Women called for the establishment of national mechanisms for the advancement of women. By 1985, 127 Member countries had established national mechanisms. The question now is: has national machinery been set up in every country? If so is it working? If a country is party to the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination (CEDAW), has it enshrined the CEDAW Convention in its constitution?
Most constitutions do not have a guaranteed quota for the representation of women, which probably explains why most Commonwealth countries have yet to achieve 30 per cent
representation of women in their Parliaments as agreed by Heads of Government first for 2005 and now for 2015.
Again, if a country is party to
CEDAW, does it fulfil the obligation to report on progress every four
Rt Hon. Rebecca Kadaga, MP.
years? What does it report? Have we achieved equity in employment, education, in the economy, the professions, the civil service? What about in the armed forces?
Varied rates of women’s representation in Africa It is necessary for each Parliament to take stock and evaluate where it stands today. Has it created space for the 51 per cent of the population who are clearly under- represented in the House?