SANF 11 No 27
The new Zambian cabinet announced by President Michael Sata fails to address the gender gap in terms of women’s participation in positions of authority.
Only two women have been appointed ministers in the trimmed 19-member Cabinet, representing just 10.5 percent of the Cabinet. These are Nkandu Luo, who is the Minister of Local Government, Housing, Early Education and Environmental Protection, and Inonge Wina, who is the Minister for Chiefs and Traditional Affairs.
There are also only four women who have been appointed deputy ministers. These are Esther Banda and Belinda Kawandami, who are deputies to Luo and Wina, respectively.
The other deputies are Jean Kapata (Ministry of Community Development, Mother and Child Health) and Alfreda Kansembe (Ministry of Finance). Of the nine appointed provincial ministers, only one is a woman – Josephine Limata (North Western Province).
In the last cabinet announced after the presidential by-election held in 2008 following the death of President Levy Mwanawasa, Zambia had three women ministers in a 22-member Cabinet, representing about 13.6 percent.
In the 2006 election, Zambia had a total of five women in a 21-member Cabinet, representing about 28.8 percent.
The latest figure falls short of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) target of 50 percent women in decision-making positions in the public and private sector by 2015 set by the SADC Summit in line with the decision of the African Union (AU), and the previous target of 30 percent by 2005.
Zambia is a signatory to the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development. Mauritius and Botswana are the only two SADC Member States that are yet to append signatures to the Protocol.
The objectives of the Protocol are to provide for the empowerment of women, eliminate discrimination, and achieve gender quality and equity through gender-responsive legislation, policies, programmes and projects.
Seven signatories to the Protocol – Angola, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, United Republic of Tanzania and Zimbabwe –have already deposited instruments of ratification with the SADC Secretariat, meaning ratification by a further three would make the Protocol “enter into force”.
Gender representation in the 20 September general elections that was won by the Patriotic Front led by Sata also fell short of the regional target. Of the 113 women parliamentary candidates that contested in the 148 constituencies, only 17 were elected.
The Zambian parliament is made up of 160 seats, including the 150 members who are elected plus eight nominated by the President. The other two members are the President and the Speaker of the National Assembly.
A total of 148 seats were contested in the 20 September election, meaning that two more by-elections are scheduled anytime this year.
In the last Zambian Parliament, there were a total of 21 women in parliament, representing 14 percent, a proportion that is higher than the current 11.5 percent.
In the SADC region, only four member states have reached the original target of 30 percent representation of women in Parliament (by 2005) and none has reached the 50 percent threshold.
South Africa has the highest representation of women in parliament at 45 percent, followed by Mozambique at 39.2 percent, and Angola and Tanzania with 38.6 percent and 36 percent, respectively.
These countries have electoral systems or balancing mechanisms that encourage participation by women, and the minimum 30 percent representation is a constitutional requirement in Tanzania.
However, despite a few setbacks in some countries, the SADC region has reached the third highest percentage of women in politics, at the parliamentary level, with 20 percent, a figure surpassed only by the Nordic countries with 41 percent and the Americas at 21 percent, according to a recent global survey.
SADC’s average percentage of women in parliament is higher than the world average of 18.5 percent, the Sub-Saharan average of 18.6 percent, Asia average at 18.4 percent, the Pacific average at 15.2 percent, and that of the Arab States (9.1 percent) which is the lowest.
