The pursuit of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030 depends significantly on achieving women’s equal participation and leadership in political and public spheres.
However, recent data show an opposing reality: women remain severely underrepresented across all levels of decision-making worldwide, highlighting a substantial gap in achieving gender parity in political life.
In dissecting the three arms of government – legislative, executive, and judicial – the pivotal role of parliaments, an assembly of representatives of a political nation, as the supreme legislative authority emerges prominently.
Women in national parliaments
According to the United Nations Women’s Organisation, only 26.5 percent of parliamentarians in single or lower houses globally are women currently, marking a modest increase from 11 percent recorded in 1995.
- Only six countries boast gender parity or more in their national parliaments’ single or lower houses, including Rwanda, Cuba, Nicaragua, Mexico, New Zealand, and the United Arab Emirates.
- While progress has been made, with 23 additional countries achieving or surpassing the 40 percent mark, disparities persist, particularly in states where women hold less than 10 percent of parliamentary seats.
- The trajectory towards gender parity in national legislative bodies appears sluggish, with projections indicating that the milestone may not be reached before 2063 if current trends persist.
- Examining regional disparities, Latin America and the Caribbean lead with women holding 36 percent of parliamentary seats, followed by Europe and Northern America with 32 percent.
- However, sub-Saharan Africa lags behind at 26 percent, followed by Eastern and South-Eastern Asia at 22 percent.
Women in parliament in Africa
In Africa, the pursuit of gender parity in political representation has seen varied approaches, with a predominant reliance on special measures like quotas to elevate women’s participation in parliamentary affairs.
- According to research, approximately 41 out of 54 African nations have implemented constitutional, legislated, or voluntary party quotas to facilitate the election of women to legislative bodies.
- Interestingly, those countries that have not embraced legislated quotas or robust voluntary party quotas tend to be Anglophone nations employing a plurality majority (first-past-the-post) electoral system, including Ghana, Nigeria, and Zambia.
- This electoral framework, characterised by a first-past-the-post mechanism, has been identified as less conducive to the elevation of women candidates compared to proportional representation systems.
- Under the proportional representation (PR) system, where legislative seats are distributed based on the proportion of votes garnered by political parties, women tend to secure more significant representation.
- However, the first-past-the-post system often favours established political networks, posing challenges for women seeking elected office.
In Nigeria, for instance, the 2008 Uwais Electoral Reform Panel Report proposed a special measure to address this imbalance by recommending the creation of 108 additional federal legislative seats to be filled through proportional representation.
Women in parliament in Nigeria
The Nigerian parliament is known as the National Assembly. The country operates a bicameral legislature made up of two independent chambers: the Senate and House of Representatives.
The Senate referred to as the red chamber comprises of 109 senators while the House of Representatives referred to as the green chamber comprises of 360 Federal Representatives.
- According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union Parline’s Global data on national parliaments, there are currently only 14 women in the 360-member House of Representatives and 4 women in the 109-member Senate.
- The current report by Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre (PLAC) shows there are no records found of female legislators in Abia, Bauchi, Gombe, Borno, Imo, Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, Niger, Osun, Sokoto, Yobe and Zamfara.
African countries with the lowest percentage of women in lower chambers of parliament.
African countries with lowest percentage of women in upper chambers of parliament or Senate
