Pakistan has twice as many women MPs in India

[HAWK73]

Pakistan has twice as many women MPs in India
Reservation to ensure fair representation of women in national legislative bodies seems more the norm than the exception globally, with almost 100 countries having some kind of quota system or the other in place. India happens to be in a minority group of over 20 countries that have no system at all to ensure a more gender-balanced national legislature. Hopefully that is soon set to change.

The average proportion of women in the national legislature is 18.5% for the Asian region, considered low by international standards, but almost twice as high as in India (11%). Even within South Asia, only Sri Lanka with 6% has a worse record. Both countries have no quota system for women in their parliaments.

In Pakistan, 22% of the National Assembly seats are held by women, made possible through the quota policy that reserves 17.5% of seats for women. In Nepal, the proportion of women members is 33% thanks to the constitutional stipulation that women must constitute at least 33% of the candidates and electoral laws that mandate that 50% of any party’s candidates should be women. In Bangladesh, a constitutional amendment was brought in to reintroduce quotas for women, by which 45 seats out of the total 345 seats are reserved for women. Following the 2008 election, Bangladesh’s parliament has 65 women MPs, which is 19% of the total seats. Incidentally, China has 21% women in the National People’s Congress without any quota policy.

Rwanda, which has reserved seats for women, happens to be the only country in the world with more women (56%) than men in their national legislative body. This is followed by Sweden with 47%, South Africa (45%), Iceland (43%), Argentina (42%), the Netherlands (41%) and Norway and Senegal with 40%. In the list of 11 countries with the highest representation of women in their national legislature, five (Sweden, South Africa, Iceland, the Netherlands and Norway) have voluntary political party quotas for women. Angola and Costa Rica, both with 37% seats occupied by women, have electoral laws granting quotas. Only two countries in the list Denmark (38%) and Senegal have no quota system.

The widely accepted benchmark to ensure a critical mass of women parliamentarians is 30%. Yet, the proportion of women in parliaments globally stood at just 18.8% in December 2009, according to the Inter parliamentary Union (IPU). By July 2008, 21 countries had successfully met the 30% critical mass target and about a quarter of these were Nordic countries known for long-standing efforts to increase the participation of women, according to the Parliamentary Research division of Canada. Another quarter were so-called post-conflict countries, which took advantage of rebuilding efforts to implement electoral reforms and political party practices, thus jump-starting the effort to boost the representation of women.

It was also noted that a majority of countries that reached the 30% benchmark had done so through measures such as proportional representation systems and electoral quotas. Countries that rely solely on the usual majority electoral system show low levels of representation of women.

The data put together on countries with quota mandated through electoral law or the constitution also indicates that having strict legal sanctions for contravention of the quota system also can show results. For instance, in Argentina, where party lists that do not comply with the electoral law will not be approved, the proportion is 42%. In Belgium, where if a party fails to comply with the gender composition , their list shall be refused by electoral authorities.

Times of India.

Pakistan has twice as many women MPs - The Times of India

 

[durgs360]

Yes. Good for Pakistan. The womens reservation bill should change that

 

[sparklingway]

Good move by the GoI. Bring on the women, albeit reserved seats are seen as "lower class" members in all legislative bodies across the world and are a symbol of the society's failure of implementing gender equality. If you are reserving seats, it means that you're accepting that social equality hasn't been achieved. Nonetheless, women representation surely leads to more women protection legislations and seeks changes towards gender equality.

 

[Spartan King]

even having seats reserved for women has not done us a lot of good. i mean what have our so called women leaders done? NOTHING!! most of the ones that are sitting are family members of politicians and they havent done squat for women in Pakistan, they are just enjoying the perks and nothing else

 

[Hyde]

very impressive news indeed and then people come say we have locked our womens at home and we do not provide them basic rights as a human

Pakistan aurtain ab woh 7th century wali nahi hain they are also standing alongside men in all kind of professions.

 

[sparklingway]

even having seats reserved for women has not done us a lot of good. i mean what have our so called women leaders done? NOTHING!! most of the ones that are sitting are family members of politicians and they havent done squat for women in Pakistan, they are just enjoying the perks and nothing else

This time there were less "family" seats, rather most were non-family party members. Generalizations and such all encompassing irrational statements are not required most of the time.

Newsline covered the issue of the effectiveness of Women Parliamentarians in their issue this month.

Read Newsline's objective opinion and short interviews with prominent members of the women caucus including Sherry Rehman, Marvi Memon and Bushra Gohar (linked at the bottom of the article)

Newsline Blog Archive One Step Forward

 

[SMC]

So basically it's due to reservation that there are more women MPs? In other words, the whole thing is artificial. Reservation and quota almost always means there's several people who get the job despite being not good enough, i.e. they wouldn't be there if the quotas were not there. I don't see how it's any different in Pakistan considering some of the women politicians I have seen.

 

[Ibr0kEmYrAz0r]

It has to be good news, more and more women are stepping out of their traditional roles and deserve more voices to represent the population as a whole. Pakistani people should be proud!

P.S.
On a side note, don't forget to mention that Pakistan had female fighter pilots back in 2006, only a very few countries had that, very good progress! (in comparison, China, although had many female pilots decades ago, only had qualified women fighter pilots in 2009; but our girls are catching up, too. )

 

[BelligerentPacifist]

These women are just there because the men in their families were either disqualified during the last parliment's graduation regulation or because the government increased the number of reserved seats and again the established men in their families pushed them to horde these seats.

They haven't worked in unions or local politics, and therefore we can't say they're there because they're qualified to do their job. Its a case of the aristocracy ruling the masses. Tomorrow they'll find a way to bring in their toddlers into the parliment too.

Some of these women's policies are women-hostile. For instance, during one of her terms as PM, BB passed the bill that if a male state official (called government servant in local parlance) passes away, his wives and children get his provident fund, and if a women official dies, her children get zilch and are free to starve, beg, steal, join street gangs, or best die, and especially not be able to get an education to become as productive as their mother.

 

[EjazR]

If I'm not mistaken, even Afghanistan has more female MPs than India and Sri Lanka.

So all countries in S. Asia except Sri Lanka have more female MPs than India. But I would say that they infact do have more female MPs than Australia or US even as the female parliamentarians/congressmen are in single digit percentages.

Although this may be good, high female parliamentarians doesn't guarantee better laws for women. Case in point is US Australia e.t.c. where females received better legislation from male parliamentarians.

Seat reservations should be the last resort. I would prefer the Election Commission of India recommendation to mandate political parties to nominate a fix percentage of their candidates as females rather than reserving the seats themselves.

 

[Nahraf]

Firstly, most of the women members of Pakistan assemblies are elected for the reserved seats of political parties rather than being elected in general elections. Secondly, most of these women members are relatives of the political leaders of those parties.

Pakistan politics: Feudals, politicians' kins dominate women reserved seats
Pakistan politics: Feudals, politicians? kins dominate women reserved seats | Overseas Pakistani Friends