By Rebecca Ekpe
A Study on Barriers to Women’s Participation and Representation in Decision Making and Elections 2024 has revealed some fundamental institutional challenges, including the lack of role models and mentorship, Electoral System Challenges, Media stereotypes, Gender Based Violence and Harassment.
Ghana’s commitment to Affirmative Action is underlined internationally by the Convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women and the Sustainable Development Goal 5, influencing national policies.
The Affirmative Action, Gender Equality Bill 2024 places a greater obligation on the government to ensure a 30% quota for women in leadership and by 2030, a mandated 50% quota for women in public decision-making.
The Gender Center for Empowering Development, GenCED has produced a report on Women’s Participation and Representation in Election 2024.
GBC News engaged the Programs Monitoring and Evaluation Officer, Gifty Ofori on aspects of their Observations where she noted that, ‘’the observations were quite revelealing highlighting institutional challenges in Ghana quest towards womens empowerment in Ghana”.
Violence Against Women:
According to GenCED, ”the first thing that we picked was the violence against women and threats, the intimidations, and then even the physical attacks on some of the women.”
It cited examples of female politicians who came under a lot of pressure during the season.
”A typical example was one of the Cynthia Morrison and Joanna Gyan issues and all that, and even Ursula Owusu, the attack at her office and all that,” Madam Ofori noted.
According to reports on December 9, 2024, a gang numbering about 15 people invaded and vandalised the office as well as the residence of the former Communications and Digitalisation Minister, Ursula Owusu Ekuful. This matter is still being investigated by the Police.
Mrs. Joana Gyan Cudjoe of the NDC had her share of legal battles during the election period, while Madam Cynthia Morrison of the NPP endured some challenges after deciding to go independent.
Marginalised Groups and Accessibility:
According to GenCED, it looked at some marginalised groups and their access to voting centres and their ability to cast their ballots. Gifty Ofori said they also checked on the availability of tactile ballots for visually impaired voters, among other electoral services.
”Some people even had verification issues, and some electoral materials, ……in a Constituency in Greater Accra Region for example…….materials which were supposed to be provided for the persons with vision impairment were not readily available, so they had to wait and all that.”
Madam Ofori explained that in some cases their ability to vote secretly was compromised.
Media and stereotyping:
According to GenCED’s Program Monitoring and Evaluation Officer, its monitoring of the media landscape was largely to measure how the women were represented across board on the various programs and the kinds of conversations that were being had about them during the election season.
She said a lot of stereotyping found its way into conversations across board.
”So prior to the election, we were monitoring the media spaces to find out how women are represented in the media spaces. And then a lot of misinformation, we saw a lot of verbal abuse also in the media spaces, more like the media houses propagated, and the other side of the women, where the misinformation were trending, where the verbal abuses were trending.
”And some people didn’t even have control over certain discussions where women were being abused online, in terms of verbal abuse online.”
As a way forward for a more gendered media conversation, GenCED is proposing capacity building for journalists, especially those within the private media, to onboard more and apply a more gender-friendly approach in their reportage would help overcome barriers to Women’s Representation in Decision making in Ghana.
