POLITICS-ZAMBIA: Women make slow, but steady Progress

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Machova Musanshi

LUSAKA, Jul 17 2003 (IPS) - -In the early hours of a cold Winters morning, the streets of Lusaka are thronging with people rushing to work.

I pass through a coffee shop on my way to the office and as I sip the hot brew my attention is drawn to two elderly women who work as sweepers for the Lusaka City Council (LCC). Eavesdropping in on their conversation, I soon discover that they are talking about the challenges that women continue to face in their pursuit of equality. As the discussion progresses, the two women begin to praise a female councilor who recently won the seat in Mandevu compound, north of the capital Lusaka.

They say that since she was elected into office six months ago, the new councilor has managed to lobby Government for communal water taps that have since been installed in the area. The councilor, according to the two, is also lobbying Government to electrify the whole Compound.

From their conversation, it is clear that people in the area are happy with the latest developments taking place in area. "She understands our problems because she is a woman. Now we have water and soon we shall have electricity," says one of the women who calls herself Amake George.

Since the Beijing Conference, the issue of women’s equal rights has been a constant discussion point in Zambia and in 2001 the Government joined the debate by adopting the National Gender Policy acknowledging the importance of a national framework for the empowerment of women and setting the groundwork for further policy development.

Since the policy was adopted more women in Zambia have joined this fight, as evidenced by the number of women that participated in the 2001 presidential elections, where Zambia broke the record to become the first country in the region to have two women contesting.

While in the parliamentary race, about 219 female candidates were adopted by various political parties as opposed to 59 during the previous elections. The two female presidential candidates were Gwendoline Konnie, a former diplomat who served Zambia in several diplomatic missions before forming the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in 2001, and Inonge Mbikusita Lewanika a former minister in the Chiluba Government who took over the leadership of Agenda for Zambia (AZ) from her brother Akashabatwa Mbikusita Lewanika.

Talking about her experience, Konnie says the elections were a challenge because it was the first time in the history of Zambia that a woman was contesting the presidential elections. "To start with it was not easy, as a women, to contest the elections because as you know they were heavily contested by nine male candidates and two female candidates. So all in all we were about 11 presidential candidates.

"I formed the Social Democratic Party in 2001 after retiring. What forced me to join politics is the suffering that I saw. I knew that the problem was with policy makers and if I was going to contribute to the alleviation of poverty then I had to ascend to the top most position so that I could influence decisions," stated Konnie

"The decision to contest the elections was quite scary and frightening at first but I looked at my past experience. From the time I was young, I have always had challenging assignments, so I looked at that and said I will go ahead to contest the elections," she adds.

The news of Konnie forming her party, and later participating in the elections, was received with mixed feelings by many Zambians including women who felt it was a taboo for a woman to challenge men. "The response by women was more influenced by men who went round telling them that I could not make a good president because I’m a woman," she said.

And as if this was not enough, Konnie faced other challenges such as the lack of financial resources, as most of the people that had pledged to help her could not honour their pledges. "These elections were very costly and the most corrupt ones because the two big parties the ruling Movement for Multiparty for Democracy (MMD) and the opposition United Party for National Development (UPND) had a lot of money to give out to voters while we had nothing. Apart from that we did not want to participate in the corrupt practices that were going on, so on that basis we lost out from potential voters," she recalls.

The media too played a role in frustrating women participants judging by the kinds of articles that were published. Konnie recalls how some journalist told her that she was not a newsmaker during one of her press briefings.

On December 4, 2001 the Times of Zambia led with a story "Embattled Nawakwi still under siege". The story portrayed opposition Forum for Democracy and Development (FDD) vice president Edith Nawakwi as a husband grabber and a lover of miniskirts. Nawakwi says this definitely had a negative influence on her campaign during the elections.

Despite all this, Konnie says she does not regret having contested the elections adding that it demonstrated that with support women could achieve a lot. The success of the two could not have been achieved without support from fellow women, particularly women organizations. "The fact that two women contested the presidential elections is evidence enough that one day a woman will rule this country," she said.

The National Women’s Lobby Group (NWLG), an organization that has been promoting and supporting women’s access and participation in decision making at all levels, also played a role in contributing towards the strengthening of women’s participation in politics. The organization undertook a number of activities aimed at attaining what it termed as prior elections. These included training of women participants, providing campaign material, bicycles and civic education.

Chipo Lungu, the Executive Director of NWLG, says; "I think we scored a point as Zambia by having two women contesting the presidential elections despite the numerous challenges that we faced," she said.

Lungu is particularly happy that government has shown commitment by adopting the National Gender Policy and the fielding of more than 200 female candidates during the elections. However, she expressed disappointment that despite taking on women candidates many of the parties provided very little support to the women.

"They left the task to us but we too had limited resources to give to every one that contested the elections. Our support was restricted to materials and not financial support. In future we would like to see parties supporting their own female candidates," says Lungu.

The other disappointing thing, she says, was the playing field which was not leveled. Prior to the elections, NWLG organized the Women in Politics (WIP) Forum and attended by all women candidates from all political parties.

After the conference, the women came up with a manifesto, a document that seeks to uphold the principle of equality as evidenced by Zambia’s ratification of International, Regional and Local instruments that promote gender equality.

A report released by NWLG indicates that women were far more disadvantaged than men. They had limited resources which resulted, oft times, in women failing to each their constituencies. "Those that had vehicles still had problems with money for fuel to reach all parts of their constituencies," says the report.

It says one woman, who had no financial support, ended up withdrawing from the elections as she could not compete with men who were heavily funded by their political parties.

Unmarried women were also victims of insults. They were called names and accused of being prostitutes. Lungu says it is evident enough that Zambia could be achieving the 30 percent SADC quota of women in government if more women were educated about their rights and the need to support each other. (ENDS/IPS/AF/SA/IP/MM/SM/03)

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