Participation

The Afghan Ministry of Justice has registered 84 political parties since a new law took effect in September 2009, according to ministry official Hakim Wardak. Another 12 are in the process of registering, he added.

“In the beginning, political circles were reluctant to form or register a political party, but now the trend has changed significantly,” Wardak told Central Asia Online.

The punishment that she and other women in her position received is hard to justify, or even discuss, she says. “We were abused by Indonesian soldiers in every way.”

Globally, women hold slightly less than 20 per cent of seats in parliament. In Asia-Pacific, just over 18 percent of all members of national parliaments are women. Women's representation in the Pacific, excluding Australia and New Zealand, is the lowest in the world, lagging behind the Arab region. On average, women are less than 10 per cent of ministers in Asia-Pacific, according to the UNDP study.

The slow progress stands in contrast to the government's tall claims regarding women development and empowerment — with such a body in place since March 23, 2012.

African Development Solutions (ADESO) has launched a project for more than 300 women in the Puntland region of Somalia to promote women's political engagement, Uganda's Daily Monitor reported Tuesday (September 18th).

A 2000 UN security council resolution that called for equal participation for women in "the maintenance and promotion of sustainable peace" has been almost totally ignored, not least by the UN itself, says the report. There have been no female chief mediators in UN-brokered peace talks and fewer than 10% of police officers and 2% of the soldiers sent on UN peacekeeping missions have been women.

As Liberian women continue to enjoy the country's political honeycomb (sweetness), with a substantial representation in the three branches of the government, their quest for high posts in future regimes stimulates ceaselessly.

What appears to be a careful search for a female personality, who may be groom to ‘take over' from President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, is underway amongst Liberian women.

Delana's achievement is not only outstanding but in the history of Fiji, there has never been a gold medallist at the Olympics.

VISITING newly elected Chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has called upon women here to push back the frontiers of sexism by strengthening their participation in decision making in their countries and in the continent.

When South African women marched against the discriminatory laws of Apartheid in 1956, their rally cry — “Wathinta umfazi, wathinta imbokotho” (you strike a woman, you strike a rock) — represented the courage and bravery of everyday citizens. With the dawn of South Africa's democratic dispensation nearly two decades ago, my country is in the throes of its teenage years.