Women face uphill battle for recognition

As Angola heads towards its first post-civil war elections, women have called for greater participation in political life. Less than 15 percent of parliamentarians are women, and this decreased with the recent death of two female MPs. At least four other women MPs are on prolonged sick leave. "We had hoped that the women who passed away, or who were recently rotated from ministerial or vice ministerial posts, would be replaced with other women, but men have been put in their place," a woman MP from the ruling MPLA, Teresa Cohen, told IRIN. Despite their education levels, women remained excluded from assuming positions of power, she said. "In the universities, women occupy most of the places - women of all ages are studying." Cohen pointed out that although women fought alongside men during the protracted civil conflict, very few occupied influential positions in the national armed forces. A key obstacle to the greater participation of women in the country's political life was the failure by the national media to promote women's rights. Despite an open invitation to the press to cover a meeting convened by female parliamentarians to highlight the impact of HIV/AIDS on the youth, said Cohen, the media failed to turn up. Gender rights activist Denise Namburete commented that when women politicians were given media coverage they were portrayed "in a derogatory light, or a way that perpetuates sexist stereotypes". Journalists attending a gender sensitisation workshop last week in the capital, Luanda, said it was easier to seek the views of male politicians, as they were generally more accessible than the women, and there were just more of them. Joao Francisco Da Cunha, one of the few male journalists at the workshop co-organised by Gender Links, a Johannesburg-based women's rights NGO, noted that the issues highlighted were especially pertinent in Angola. "Exchanging ideas about gender is relatively new in our society. We are progressing slowing in our awareness of gender - we're not there yet. We were in crisis for so many years," he told IRIN. Overall, Southern Africa falls far short of targets set in 1997 by regional governments to have at least 30 percent women parliamentarians in national assemblies by 2005. Only three countries - Mozambique, South Africa and Seychelles - have over 30 percent of women in parliament. According to Gender Links, the number of women in parliament throughout the region had increased by 1.9 percent, from 17.5 percent in 1997 to 19.4 percent in 2003. The first Gender and Media Baseline Study in Southern Africa, conducted last year by Gender Links and the Media Institute of Southern Africa, showed that, on average, women represented just eight percent of politicians whose views were sought for comment by the media.