The Gender Centre for Empowering Development's (GenCed) Executive Director, Madam Esther Tawiah, has counselled gender-based Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) to improve their relationships with female Members of Parliament (MPs) in order to advance gender equality policies and laws.
She noted that because gender concerns touch across several policy areas, it was necessary to extend lobbying efforts outside of the Gender Caucus to other parliamentary committees.
"This is the error that many of us working on gender issues commit...
Since there is a Gender Caucus, we presume that they are aware of all gender-related concerns, she added.
The counsel was given by Madam Tawiah during the first seminar on gender advocacy in parliament, which was held at Parliament House in Accra and was put on by the Parliamentary Network Africa (PN Africa). An African civil society organisation called PN Africa monitors parliaments and advocates for transparent government.
Since gender issues touch on every aspect of society, Madam Tawiah also underlined the necessity to mainstream gender concerns at all the different Parliamentary Committees.
She claimed that in order to have the appropriate influence in terms of advocacy, CSOs working on gender issues must be aware of the legislative procedure.
In order to promote improved parliamentary activity, she advised the CSOs to continue their interactions with the female MPs.
Even though women make up the majority of the population in Ghana, Mr. Sammy Obeng, Executive Director, Parliamentary Network Africa, claimed in his opinion that girls' voices and those of women are underrepresented. But he said that the issue appears to have a global component that affects the local legislatures.
Mr. Obeng used the example that following the 2020 general elections in Ghana, there were around 25.5 percent of women in parliament, or one in four women globally.
According to parliamentary data, women are now better represented than they were in the past.
However, in the Ghanaian election, just 40 of the 275 MPs are women, making up roughly 15% of all the participants—a significant underrepresentation of the global average of 25.5 percent. The Inter-Parliamentary Union, the global union of all parliaments, was also cited by Mr. Obeng as saying that it would take at least 50 years to realise the ideal of gender parity in parliaments throughout the world.
Then, he continued, "we can very much appreciate how long it may take to have any semblance of what we are aiming for in the Ghanaian election if at 25.5 percent the assumption is that it would take 50 years for this to happen.
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