Amendment No2 and the prospects for 2023

Nduduzo Tshuma, Assistant Editor
AMENDMNENT No2 of the Constitution that extended the women’s quota in Parliament while reserving a 30 percent quota for women in local authorities is set to boost women political participation in the 2023 national elections, a Cabinet Minister has said.

However, the legal instrument, which has also introduced a quota for youths, would be more effective if complemented in other formats of voting that would also see more women taking up leadership positions.

In the Amendment (2) of the Constitution effected last year, Section 124 of the Constitution was amended to give the women’s quota an additional ten-year life.

The amendment also saw youths getting 10 seats in Parliament where:
“Persons aged from twenty-one to thirty-five years of age, one from each of the provinces into which Zimbabwe is divided, elected under a party-list system of proportional representation which is based on the votes cast for candidates representing political parties in a general election for constituency members in the provinces, and in which male and female candidates are listed alternately.”

The amendment also provides that political parties must ensure that ten of the sixty women members are under the age of thirty-five, women with disabilities are represented on their party lists and young women with disabilities are represented on their party lists in terms of an Act of Parliament.

Also amended was Section 268 for ten women to be elected by a system of proportional representation in provincial councils to also include women living with disabilities.

The amendment of Section 277 reserved a 30 percent quota for women in local authorities.

The amendment adds to other constitutional, regional, continental and international instruments that Zimbabwe is party to on the promotion of women political participation.

Despite the instruments however, women political participation has remained worryingly low.

According to the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission, of the 28 Parliamentary seats contested in the March 26 by elections 21,4 percent were won by females and 78,6 percent by males.

In the 119 council seats, female winners accounted for 15,5 percent while males were 84,5 percent.

The Minister of Women Affairs, Community and Small and Medium Enterprises Development, Dr Sithembiso Nyoni acknowledged that the participation of women in politics remains low but expressed hope that 2023 will paint a different picture.

“In this by election I can understand it because men wanted to protect their positions and retained those who were already on the ground,” said Dr Nyoni.

“However, come 2023 we are really encouraging women to participate in politics. We are going to have a quota for women at local government and if we work very hard to field women as councillors and have a top up of 30 percent, we may reach the 50/50 parity,” she said.

“We need to ensure also that those that are voted for also up the bar so that we do not depend on the quota alone.”

Zanu-PF Matabeleland North provincial chairperson Cde Richard Moyo said they were encouraging women to contest even outside the quota system to boost their participation.

“The women are also given equal chance contest in the primary elections, we have Cde (Musa) Ncube who won in the recent Tsholotsho South by election. She contested in the primary elections and won and we helped her during the campaigns and she won,” said Cde Moyo.

He said the primary elections were the biggest hurdle as there is stiff competition from contesting candidates.

“In the campaign rallies that we addressed in Binga and Tsholotsho ahead of the by elections, most of the attendees were women so we really encourage women to take part in politics. They must also support each other, most of the time they don’t support each other so in encouraging them to take part in politics, we would also sensitise them to support each other,” said Cde Moyo.

Citizens Coalition for Change Bulawayo interim provincial spokesperson Mr Swithern Chirowodza said his party had given women senior position its interim structures as part of its empowerment process.

He gave examples of Ms Thabitha Khumalo (chairperson), Advocate Fadzayi Mahere (spokeperson) and Lynnette Kore (vice president) who sit in the party’s apex committees. “In short empowering women requires women to hold influential positions within in the party first so that is a prerequisite,” he said.

“Secondly we will adopt a constitution that obliges members to pursue the cherished 50/50 gender parity.”

Mr Chirowodza said the current female legislators from his party is far below the threshold and they would make it their agenda to improve numbers.

Gender activist Ms Patience Phiri said there was need for an evaluation of the impact of Amendment No2 in after five years to gauge its impact towards promoting women in politics.

She said party processes need to be transparent so that there is selection of women on the basis of capacity.

“We need to see that in the selection, the party systems ate transparent so that we avoid issue of sexual abuse and other forms of abuse for women to qualify to those quotas,” she said.

Ms Phiri challenged the media to improve coverage on women leaders and not dwell only on negativity.