Gender Policies In African States

Introduction.

I want to focus on Modern gender policy development, making reference to the Women in Development (WID) projects and the Gender and Development projects within Tanzania and South Africa.

Gender issues have always been part of Afrikan transformation and transitions, in the fight for Afrikan states to be liberated. There seemed to be a forgotten cry and plea for women’s rights and liberation. Afrikan states drove hegemonic and patriarchal liberation movements and failed to acknowledge women as critical role players in the struggle and fight for liberation of Afrikan states. Women have had to themselves fight for recognition in these new democracy’s and liberal states. While we can read about great Afrikan liberal and struggle heroes throughout the continent, the likes of Thomas Sankara Burkina Faso, we speak of Kwame Nkrumah, Patrice Lumumba, and Oliver Tambo amongst many others.

Female who too played critical roles in these liberation movements and policy drafting in their states, are excluded and thrown a bone to Choo on. Joséphine Ouédraogo Burkina Faso – who played a critical role during and after the Sankara Administration, what about Charlotte Maxeke, she barley exists in our history books, the liberation of the people of Afrika is masculine in its nature. “The revolution cannot triumph without the emaciation of women.” - Thomas Sankara.  Therefore women organizations and writers have had to come up to the stage and take their places, in challenging gender unfriendly policies and making new policies that can begin the process of gender rights transformation and bringing the process of  deconstructing the patriarchal  systems that govern the continent to the light.

We will examine policies and programmes that the Republic of South Africa has put in place to protect the interests of women rights, I will be looking at affirmative action using, Act 55 of 1998. Further we will look at Rural Women‘s movement and how South Africa has used this program to advance women in rural areas, through development programs.

We will further move to Tanzania and examine its Ministry Of Community Development Gender And Children and look at their gender and women policies that have shaped the gender equality programme, economic/labour activity and Gender and Advocacy within it policies. This examination will be informed by the National Gender strategy Development plan.

The Republic of South Africa

Affirmative action – (Act 55 of 1998)

Affirmative action was drawn up to address equality matters within the market place in RSA. The Employment equity (Act 55 of 1998) was then developed in the plight to address equality, this was to put in place because the liberation movements of South Africa fought for economic inclusion and recognition. Woman have been for years been excluded from economic activity. Affirmative action was a direct response to these issues.

The new constitution of South Africa afforded (section 9) opportunity to all South Africans regardless of gender.

“(3) The state may not unfairly discriminate directly or indirectly against anyone on one or more grounds, including race, gender, sex, pregnancy, marital status, ethnic or social origin, colour, sexual orientation, age, disability, religion, conscience, belief, culture, language and birth.” therefore a policy framework to redress these issues was drawn up, and that was down as Affirmative action in 1995.

The framework mandate was to make the labour markets as fair as possible, making the markets and environment non-discriminatory and socially equitable. In essence the call is to redress the equality issue in South Africa. Equality looking at giving equal rights, economically and in opportunity access.

The Employment Equity Act, this is the acts purpose. Government Gazette 

1.1 Purpose of the Act: Section 2

The purpose of the Act is to achieve equity in the workplace, by

A.        promoting equal opportunity and fair treatment in employment through the elimination of unfair discrimination; and

B.        implementing affirmative action measures to redress the disadvantages in employment experienced by designated groups, to ensure their equitable representation in all occupational categories and levels in the workforce.

What then does it mean for women in South Africa and what does it mean for the labour market bosses? This means that companies need to put in place employment equity plans which address the discriminatory practices and nature. The Act also recognises previously disadvantaged black people, with BEE. This was Act 53 of 2003 (Black Economic Empowerment), this act is inclusive of women, youth, people with disability and people living in rural areas. This act allows for the companies to be scored on how many of the EE they have adhered to, the higher your scores the more chances on business dealing with government you have.

The country of South Africa has put some policies that advanced the gender divide and inequalities, but there are still questions of the effectiveness of the EE and if it is really giving women the opportunities it claims to be. With women still earning less than their male counterparts and still in lower ranking then there male colleagues, the inequality question is still being challenged and raised. Black women are still lagging behind in recognition. According to Anita Bosch “The South African gender pay gap is estimated, on average, to be between 15% to 17%”, according to her, women would have to combine their salaries of two months to catch up their male counterparts. This still raises questions on the effectiveness of these policies.

The development of these policies further serves a minority of black women, the educated elite, the. Those in rural South Africa and townships, have to access to higher education and information, therefore the information and education gap makes the redress of these past equality issues lack.  Women in Rural development, a need to address the inequality of women in rural areas has seen organizations and movements popping up and being formed to try to address this issue. Women in rural areas are victims or social and economic abuse. Using God Dies by the Nile by Nawal El-Saadawi’s, we are introduce the victimisation of rural woman, through social classism, politics and tradition. The woman remains a commodity in rural areas,       “In any society, it is not possible to separate religion from the political system, nor to             keep sex separate from politics. The trilogy composed of politics, religion and                                sexism the most sensitive of all issues in any society.” (El Saadawi 1980:4).

In the case of South African women, it is politics, tradition and sexism. It tradition that impressions women, into the patriarchal system, that allows them to be owned by their husbands, for any livelihood they make, goes to their men or if they have no man at home, which is a pandemic in South African black families (the missing farther), their money goes into feeding, clothing and schooling of their children. Many times these women have no help from anyone.

With these problem arising from the rural women, a response was necessary, organizations like the Rural Women Movement were established. RWM was established 1998, but officially launched in 2000.  “RWM works to enable women to access, own, control, use, and manage land and natural resources in their own right” , thee project help the women in becoming economically  empowered. These project include farming projects, where women are given land and lent farming equipment and are taught how to farm. This project give rural women their own way of making an income, without being dependent on anyone.

There are more rural women projects in SA, which to seek to address economic divide and inequality for women in rural areas, projects such as, Rural Women's Development and Empowerment Project and Isivande Women's Fund. The South African government, to have made strides in funding coops and these projects targeted directly at the women in these areas.

The United Republic Of Tanzania

The Tanzanian government has also come up with Government Gender Strategy.  “In recognition of this fact the government of the United Republic of Tanzania has taken various measures to ensure equality of all its citizens and, in particular, gender equality and gender equity.” A policy of Women and Gender development was drafted in 2000, by the ministry of Community Development, to also redress the inequality of women in Tanzania.

“The aim of this policy is to ensure that the gender perspective is mainstreamed into all policies, programmes and strategies. In order to meet this objective, the national machinery initiated the establishment of gender focal points in ministries, independent government departments, regional and local authorities. These focal points in turn will be responsible for gender mainstreaming in their respective plans and programmes, while working with the national machinery, which has a coordinating role in gender development.”

The government of Tanzania has put in great policy and institution to protect the rights of women, it has one of the most progressive policy document in Africa.  The country’s gender policy has made it easier for women to enter pre dominantly male dominated spaces. With funding being made available to women to start business and to access higher education. More laws have been amended to be more inclusive and give equal rights to women, like the Village Land Act No. 5, that allows women as well to buy and own land, further developments on the   Education Sector Development Programme (2000-2015), have been made that has given access to young women and girls to schools and universities. The country has also made stride in their political environment, the 14th amendment to the Constitution increased the number of seats reserved for women Members of Parliament from 15 percent to 30 percent.

These are great strides that have been made, discriminatory laws are still in place, and they have been met with strong resistance from the still very present patriarchal systems.

Some of these laws include the Marriage Act   of 1971 section 10. Permits polygamy, but women themselves can only have one husband.  This law puts to question tradition and law, there is still a backlog in the proration of traditional women, in Afrikan systems, the women, may have more rights in the face of Westernised political systems. But governments seem to not challenge traditional oppressions. Tanzania is a great example of such, although the country has progressive policies for women, it stills has not faced and challenged traditional customs, that remove power from women. More examples of this Act, is the legal ages for marriage difference (s.15) girls can legally marry at 15-years –old, while boys 18.

A serious issue of child brides and school dropouts among Afrikan women is alarming, and this law seems to be perpetuating this problem. When young girls marry and fall pregnant they do not usually go to school and that increases the number of uneducated Afrikan women.

Conclusion

While some ground work has been made, in countries like South African,Tanzania , Liberia, Malawi, Rwanda. We have seen Afrikan state like Liberia, having their first female president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Malawi, having also their first female president Joyce Banda, with Rwanda’s female representation in parliament out numbering that of the men . We can see that Afrika is transforming in political inclusion, but the economic activity still puts women on the side lines. The policy seem to somewhat an exploitation method for companies to get cheaper labour, the same works. There needs to be a review and challenge of the salary gap in these policy drafting. “Though our men have already reached the edge of this great garden that is the revolution, our women are still confined to depersonalizing darkness,” Thomas Sankara.

We have to acknowledge NGO’s and Foundations that have taken up the mantle to liberate women in rural and traditional areas, but Afrikan women are some of the imprisoned women. Women in rural Afrika are unprotected and unseen, unheard and only counted when the number of women who die in child birth, the number of infected women (disease and viruses), child marriages, with our sanitary pads or dead. That is when these women are counted.

They may need to be a radical policy chance that they AU and all sub structures need to come up with, that directly deal with Afrikan issue, not Westernized ideas of equality that don’t address the Afrikan native.