By Rebecca Ekpe
Currently in Ghana, there are 40 females out of the 275 Members of Parliament in the 8th Parliament of the Fourth Republic. Clearly, this number is likely to decrease as some women in Parliament lost their seats during the primaries ahead of the December 7 elections.
Among them are Sarah Adwoa Safo, Dome-Kwabenya, Sheila Bartels, Ablekuma North, Gifty Twum Ampofo, Abuakwa North, Ama Pomaa, Juaben, and Freda Prempeh, Tano North.
Creating equal opportunities and ensuring that more women are represented to address the matter of underrepresentation of women in politics, policy and decision-making levels as well as in public life in general has taken centre stage in Ghana of late, especially with the passage of the Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity Bill 2024, into law.
ABANTU For Development, with support from the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF), is implementing a project titled, “Strengthening Activism for a Gender-Responsive Elections 2024 in Ghana”.
It convened a platform to give women parliamentary aspirants, political parties, civil society organisations, the media, and other key stakeholders the platform to discuss ways of advancing women’s participation and representation in the upcoming General Election, taking into consideration the passage of Ghana’s Affirmative Action (Gender Equity) Act 2024 (Act 1121).
Becky Ahadzi, Coordinator for the AA Bill Coalition, believes that there are opportunities to ensure that women are represented at various decision-making spaces using the current legal regime. She encouraged the women to take advantage of the opportunities therein to have their voices heard.
‘’The act now mandates a minimum requirement of 30 percent of women in decision-making positions from now till 2026, and this should increase to 50 percent by 2030. The passage of this AA Act is a step in the right direction since it provides a legal framework with targets and timelines to ensure gender equality by the year 2020,’’ she said.
As a way of building the capacity of the women to assess the opportunities available to them Susan Aryeetey, Executive Director with FIDA-Ghana, took the women through a Gender scorecard exercise to practicalize the opportunities available to them in propelling gender equity.
It was obvious that shortfalls existed in the Manifestos of some of the political parties going into the December polls. There was consensus that political parties have to be intentional about creating spaces for women to be part of the decision-making processes.
Above all, funding opportunities should be deliberately created to actualise Ghana’s Affirmative Action (Gender Equity) Act 2024 (Act 1121).