Issue No. 609
International
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24 - 30 October 2002 Issue No. 609 International |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Recommend this page | ||
Equality in the Union
The African Union is paving the way to gender equality, at least within its own secretariat, if not throughout the continent. Akyaaba Addai-Sebo reports from Addis Ababa
This time African leaders have bitten the bullet and put their critics to shame by scoring a world-first as regards equal representation of women and men (gender mainstreaming) in the affairs of the African Union (AU). For, nowhere else in the world, whether at national, regional, continental, or even global levels has the decision ever been taken that the highest echelons of an inter-governmental organisation will have a 50 per cent representation of women and men. In this respect, the AU Executive Council has taken the unprecedented step of requiring equal gender representation for the post of commissioners to the Secretariat, the top ten administrative jobs within the Union. For all intents and purposes, this is a case of equal opportunity in practice.
Although African women, like women the world over, still lag behind their male counterparts in many critical areas, including education, employment, remuneration, promotion and decision-making, things may be changing at a fast and furious pace.
However, change will only be effected if Africa's foreign ministers, who constitute the Executive Council of the Union, live up to the challenge. If the council really implements its decision, the twenty-first century will belong to women and men alike. Africa will then benefit from the release of the rich potential of her human resources, namely African women and men, at home and in the Diaspora.
The Executive Council may face difficulties in finding eligible women for the post of commissioners to the Secretariat of the AU. Qualifications for this job require women with considerable executive experience at the national or regional levels. However, for most women cultural, social and educational discrimination have generally resulted in their exclusion from top managerial decision-making positions.
In other words, women who are invisible at the national level can hardly be expected to be present and visible at the regional and continental levels. Therefore, initial discrimination becomes the basis and justification for further discrimination in what becomes an unending cycle.
But the AU leadership has shown the political will to break this cycle of exclusion. One way of overcoming this handicap would be to go beyond conventional parameters of the continent and select some highly qualified women from the Diaspora.
In Durban, South Africa, AU leaders called on Africans in the Diaspora to become an integral part of the Union. African politicians can look to the African Continent as well as the Diaspora in their quest for capable men and women who will take on the responsibility of leading the continent.
While the required equal gender composition of the Secretariat's commissioners will pave the way to integrating women into the top decision-making body of the AU, it is by no means the only mechanism for gender mainstreaming. More importantly, mainstreaming will not be the sole responsibility of a select number of appointed women commissioners. Mary Maboreke, head of the Gender and Development Division at the AU told Al-Ahram Weekly, "It is important to make this one clarification. The fact that our leaders have mandated 50 per cent gender representation [at the commissioners' level] does not mean that it is these female commissioners who will be charged with responsibility for mainstreaming gender in the African Union."
Maboreke went to on explain that although ultimate responsibility for promoting gender equality in the Union rests with the chairperson, other top-level officers will have their fair share of responsibilty in promoting change. "The deputy chairperson, commissioners, senior management and officers will all be assessed on the basis of their gender performance. They will, of course, have technical backstopping from the Office for Gender Equality Promotion," said Maboreke.
Making the responsibility for gender performance more broad will be critical to gender mainstreaming, she added. The broad range of supervision and evaluation of performance at the AU augurs well for the prospects of actual equality in the organistion. The commitment to equality is one of the differences between the new AU and the now defunct Organisation of African Unity (OAU), Maboreke says. "This is especially true given that instead of the four key organs which the Women Gender and Development Division serviced at the OAU, the Office for Gender Equality Promotion at the AU will be servicing 17 organs."
Amara Essy, a high-ranking official at the AU, expressed much confidence in the project. He believes that the organisation has so far suceeded in promoting and establishing the principle of gender equality. Essy especially credits some of the women in the AU leadership for having the political will to effect change.
"Africa is so fortunate at this crucial time to have a formidable [woman] foreign minister as the chairperson of the Executive Council of the Ministers of the Union, in the person of Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma of South Africa, Essy told Al-Ahram Weekly. "I shall be working with her to ensure that the goal of equal representation of women and men in the key organs of the Union is achieved starting with the choice of commissioners."
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