PRESS RELEASE

 

A Club of Madrid-WRAPA delegation, led by Former President of Mauritius Cassam Uteem, promotes constitutional and electoral reform for increased women’s political participation in Nigeria

 

• The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the Electoral Reform Committee (ERC) asked the Club of Madrid to submit a memorandum with recommendations and strategies for reform for greater women’s participation.

• Pres. Uteem: “no political parties can exist without internal democracies and no democracy is complete without women”

• Deputy Governor of Lagos State, Princes Sarah Adebisi Sosan, underlined the Governor’s commitment to support the increase of women’s participation in leadership.

• Journalists met by the delegation committed themselves to continue to engage with women’s organisations working on political participation for women in leadership


Lagos, February 21, 2008 - The Club of Madrid, in partnership with Women’s Rights Advancement and Protection Alternative (WRAPA) Nigeria, organized the second of three planned missions to Nigeria from 18 to 22 February 2008 following the first successful mission to Nigeria in November 2007. The mission allowed for dialogue and shared experiences with different key Nigerian leaders to secure support and concrete commitments by political parties, electoral commission, electoral reform committee, the media and Civil society to support the realisation of women’s participation in politics.

The visit was part of an initiative called the African Women Leaders Project (AWLP) funded by the European Commission and the Canadian International Development Agency, through the Club of Madrid in partnership with WRAPA, to support and strengthen women’s participation and performance in politics and other high level decision making positions. The project is implemented in 3 countries in Africa: Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Uganda.

The delegation was led by the Former President of Mauritius Cassam Uteem and supported by constitutional lawyer and women’s rights activist Prof. Mrs. Jadesola Akande, and two international experts, Professor Ruth Oniang’o, Former Member of the Kenyan Parliament and Shadow Minister for Education, and Clem McCartney, Policy and Content Consultant for Club of Madrid’s Shared Societies Project. The delegation was privileged to meet with the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Maurice Iwu; Members of the Electoral Reform Committee (ERC), including its Chairman the Hon. Justice Mohammed Lawal Uwais; political party leaders, the Director General of the Federal Radio Corporation; the Director General of the Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) and members of civil society organizations working on constitutional and electoral reforms. The delegation also travelled to Lagos State where they met the Deputy Governor, government officials, parliamentarians, female aspirants for local government elections and women from the business community.

The members of the delegation discussed a broad range of issues concerning the importance of women’s participation in politics and governance and sought to understand the role of INEC in reforming the electoral process to ensure greater inclusion of women and other excluded groups. The Chairman of INEC agreed that the electoral process was largely unfair to women in Nigeria and that INEC has indeed identified key issues that work against women’s political participation such as gender inequality, violence, excessive influence of money in politics and negative public perceptions of women in politics. He informed the delegation that INEC is committed to addressing these issues and is ready to support initiatives that could redress the situation. Prof. Iwu was encouraged by the dialogue created at the meeting and invited the Club of Madrid and WRAPA to partner with INEC to support the reform process. He promised on his side to fully scrutinise INEC’s legal provision with a view to identifying areas that could be used as entry to positive reforms. He further committed INEC to sponsor legislative initiatives on the electoral process through private member bills. 
 
The Chairman of the Electoral Reform Committee (ERC) explained that the recommendations of the Committee will be based on views of the people of Nigeria and noted that although the Terms of Reference of the ERC had no specific reference to women as a group they were broad enough to accommodate any reform including proportional representation and other measures to facilitate women’s greater participation in politics. The Committee acknowledged the existing gap in the Constitution and electoral laws in enhancing the participation of women in politics and was concerned that women groups had not yet made their submissions. The Chairman then called on WRAPA and other women groups to submit their proposals.

A request was made to the Club of Madrid to submit a memorandum on electoral systems’ design, including specific tools for improving women’s participation in electoral processes. The Chairman promised to have his committee thoroughly examine such structures to see how Nigeria could benefit from them. President Uteem thanked the Chairman of the Committee for this great opportunity offered to Nigerians to contribute to the reform of their electoral process and offered the resource base of the Club of Madrid in supporting the Committee.

During the mission, the Club of Madrid-WRAPA delegation met with leaders of political parties. Pres. Uteem stressed that “no political parties can exist without internal democracies and no democracy is complete without women” and urged the political parties to work further in achieving the goals of the Beijing Platform for Action. Political party leaders acknowledged the importance for women to be included within political party leadership structures. After an animated discussion, they accepted that Nigeria has a large number of credible women who can hold leadership positions within the parties, but that the political culture does not work well for the advancement of women especially regarding the excessive use of money, late night meetings, and political violence. Mr. McCartney urged the political leaders to examine the cultural obstacles which hinder women’s participation in politics and encouraged the parties to review their internal systems to accommodate both women and men in the leadership. Pres. Uteem highlighted the need for change in the mentality of the parties for equal partnership. Prof. Oniang’o made a passionate appeal to political leaders to respect and provide space for women within party leadership pointing out that such a move would in fact greatly enhance the image of any party pursuing such a line.

In the meeting with the media the delegation emphasised that the media has a great role to play in bringing about changes by influencing public perceptions on women’s participation in politics and leadership. The media made a commitment to continue to engage effectively with women’s organisations working on Political participation for women in leadership.

The delegation visited Lagos State and met with the Deputy Governor, Her Excellency Princes Sarah Adebisi Sosan. During an interactive discussion with the Deputy Governor and senior women leaders in the State, the Deputy Governor said that Lagos state had a high number of women leaders in the State including the Deputy Speaker, the Chief Whip, Secretary to the State Government, Commissioners and Permanent Secretaries. The Deputy Governor attributed the increase in the number of women participating in leadership to the strong support the state had received from both the former and current State Governors both of whom are in fact men.  She agreed that although the state had not reached the 30% affirmative action requirement, the Governor is committed to support the increase of women participation in leadership.

At the town hall meeting of women leaders President Uteem  emphasised  the need for reflecting on the opportunity of introducing the quota system to ensure better representation of women both in Parliament and in politics generally. Addressing the meeting, Prof. Jadesola Akonde said that the electoral reform cannot succeed unless there was a parallel constitutional reform in Nigeria and called for the entrenchment of affirmative action within the legal framework.

The Mission held a successful interactive workshop for female and male parliamentarians and women leaders in governance. Prof. Oniang’o emphasised that because the playing field on politics was not level, women need support through affirmative action and quotas. She called for a United Nations resolution to provide for quotas and proportional representation.

 

 

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The Club of Madrid is an independent organization dedicated to strengthening democracy around the world by drawing on the unique experience and resources of its Members – 70 democratic former heads of state and government. In partnership with other organizations and governments that share its democracy-promotion goals, the Club of Madrid provides peer to peer counsel, strategic support and technical advice to leaders and institutions working towards democratic transition and consolidation. www.clubmadrid.org

 

 

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