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Blessings Chidakwa
Herald Reporter
“We need women at all levels, including the top, to change the dynamic, reshape the conversation, to make sure women’s voices are heard and heeded, not overlooked and ignored,” American business executive and first woman to serve on Facebook’s board of directors Sheryl Sandberg once said.
Zimbabwe has been a different case over the past years as the voices of women, especially in politics, have been minimal, although there has been some notable progress by both Government and political parties to promote their voices.
Women participation at all levels of decision making remains critical for the development of the country, especially at local government.
Local government plays a fundamental role in the day-to-day lives of women, the elderly, youth and men by virtue of being closest to the general populace.
An analysis by Gender Links of the July 2018 harmonised elections shows that the representation of women in local government declined from 16 to 14 percent.
Out of 6 800 candidates who contested for seats in the country’s 92 local authorities, only 1 156 (17 percent) were women.
Many factors have been thrown around, but according to women, their exclusion in key empowerment projects such as mining is hindering their participation in politics, as they are usually associated with low-income projects like chicken rearing.
Zvimba Rural District Council ward 32 Councillor and Zanu PF District Coordinating Committee finance chairperson, Mrs Mabel Nyadzayo, said projects like chicken rearing, when done at a small scale, were too insignificant to have a meaningful impact towards empowering women in politics.
“They seem to have their origins from the fact that women’s environment is the kitchen,” she said.
“The assumption is that if you improve the kitchen environment then women are empowered.
“It is assumed that the chickens will be sold and bring income or used as food. However, the aim is to get the woman out of the kitchen into high offices.”
Although women are now slowly undertaking big projects, including in mining, they still remain a minority compared to their male counterparts who usually elbow them economically during political campaigns.
However, there seems to be a great political will from the Second Republic, with President Mnangagwa, a champion of gender equality himself, last year extending the women’s quota to local authorities.
“Under my leadership, my administration is facilitating the participation of women in politics, leadership and decision making processes,” he said while addressing a virtual high-level meeting of the United Nations General Assembly on the 25th anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women.
“More women have been appointed into Cabinet and other senior positions in the public sector.”
Women’s equality and empowerment is one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, but also integral to all dimensions of inclusive and sustainable development.
Women’s Affairs, Community, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Minister, Dr Sithembiso Nyoni, recently said there was need to strengthen institutional mechanisms that deal with gender equality through provision of adequate funding.
“As a ministry, we are supporting the implementation of the National Financial Inclusion Strategy to ensure women have access to start up and operational capital to enable them to actively participate in the economy,” she said.
Local Government and Public Works Deputy Minister, Marian Chombo, said women in politics are hamstrung by a number of factors that limit their participation in political processes.
She said in as much as the Constitution has provisions that promote gender balance in all spheres of life, women remained under-represented in politics.
“It is of key consequence that the empowerment of women and their participation in decision making positions is made a priority,” she said.
“The more women are represented in politics and decision making positions, the more it is likely for the country to achieve the objectives of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).”
Kadoma deputy mayor, Cllr Tendai Kokera, is of the view that most projects do empower women to participate in politics if they are managed correctly.
“Most women rely on loans, but the main challenge being faced by women in politics is lack of capital, no collateral security to secure the required loan,” she said.
“Women end up prioritising small financial companies who provide low amount of money than the required sum to venture into big projects.”
Gender Links Zimbabwe country manager, Ms Priscilla Maposa, said while trivial projects were a stepping stone to political participation, women needed to be major players in local economic development and the mainstream economy.
“Women need economic empowerment that gives them higher and sustainable incomes in major economic sectors like mining and agriculture,” she said.
Women for Economic and Social Empowerment (WESE) executive director, Ms Kundai Sabrina Chambara said real empowerment programmes economically empower women, removing them from being beggars to financially independent.
“It gives them a muscle since Zimbabwean politics campaigns need money for movements and selling of ideas,” she said.
Ms Chambara said there were other barriers which hinder women’s participation in politics not only money but society, culture, violence and sexual violence.
Beitbridge ward 6 Clr, Agnes Tore said economic projects were key as they improved women’s ability to meet campaigning costs and even travelling expenses for meetings.
Women in Local Governance Forum Midlands chapter president, Councillor Idirashe Dongo, was on cloud nine due to the 30 percent threshold accorded to local authorities, but still insisted that women empowerment projects remained key.
“Women’s representation at the local level is thus critical for prioritising women’s practical and development needs, as well as localising the Sustainable Development Goals through policy decisions on education, primary healthcare, water and sanitation, transport and a host of other services,” she said.
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