It’s Election Day in Nigeria, Dorothy Ukel Nyone has been preparing for months. She drew up her manifesto and mobilized support from women in her region. When she got to the polls for the primaries, contestants came ready to fight, with their own armed thugs. Chairs were thrown and shots were fired. A ward chairman was shot. The women fled the scene and a few of the men as well. The men who were prepared for violence remained and cast their vote. This scene is not fictional nor is it unusual in Nigeria where political office is often taken by violence. Men are viewed as more capable of delivering on their promise to win a seat in the parliament and get the financial backing of local lords.¹

Across Africa women are pushing to gain more representation in the local and national legislatures where they can lobby for the needs of women and give them a voice in politics. It’s an upward hill battle where women face discrimination and sexual harassment. Many traditional cultures dictate that men should be in charge and that women should have a secondary status; overcoming these traditional morays has not been easy, but slowly, women are gaining political power. Currently only eight percent of the parliamentary posts in East Africa are held by women.² 

Sierra Leone
In August and September 2007, Sierra Leone held legislative elections and two rounds of presidential elections. This small West African country was devastated by civil war from 1991 to 2002, when it changed from a military dictatorship to emerging democracy to a full-fledged democracy. Corruption though is still quite rampant and the country ranked 148th out of 163 nations in a 2006 Corruption Perception Index produced by Transparency International.³ Sixty-four out of 566 candidates for the 2007 legislative elections were women. None of the political parties chose women candidates for the residential elections.

One hurdle for women in the 2007 elections was a return to the constituency-based electoral system, in which elections are held for single-member constituencies. In the 1996 and 2002 elections, the legislature was chosen by proportional representation, in which seats were given to parties based on the percent of votes each party receives during the election. Each party then determined who got the seats based on party lists. Using this system, in 2002, the number of seats given to female candidates tripled, giving them 14 percent of the seats. Women had an easier time getting nominated to party lists with the proportional system and fear that a return to the constituency-based system will decrease their seats.⁴

Another hurdle for women has been the minimum level of schooling required for candidates. Only one out of four women in Sierra Leone can read, leaving a small pool of potential candidates. More than 75 percent of Sierra Leone’s population lives on less than $2/day and many women, widowed from the civil war, are the primary breadwinners for the family.⁵ 

A third hurdle is culture. Maimuna Kamara, a hotel bar tender, notes “men in this country still believe that women are their properties and that they only belong in the house to take care of children,. They don’t understand that the world is changing.” Cynthia Synder, a sociology student at Njala University, one of Sierra Leone’s two universities, argued that most indigenous tribes in the country believe that men are superior over women. She states: “"The men are holding this cultural belief sacred. Our men dislike women competing with them, doing the same job and they also ascribe to the idea that a highly educated woman is a threat to men because she would be argumentative and not respect them.”⁶

Many of the female candidates for the legislature shied away from stating a position on women’s issues, such as female gential mutilation (FGM). FGM is supported by large sections of the country, including secret female societies—known as “Bondos”—that perform the ritual as part of an initiation into womenhood. Female candidates need to vote of women in these societies, so they do not make banning FGM part of their platform.⁷  

Sierra Leone has signed the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and the Maputo Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, both of which ban FGM. Nonetheless, the government has not created a law banning it. Meanwhile, the Ministry of Social Welfare, Gender and Children's Affairs is trying to establish an age of consent and government officials have been traveling the countryside to educate women about the harmful effects of this practice.⁸ 

The Fifty-Fifty Group, an NGO in Sierra Leone, has been campaigning for 30 percent of seats in Parliament to be reserved for women. This number was developed by the UN Conference for Women in 2005, which noted that this is the minimum percent needed for women to be able to exercise influence. In the 2007 elections, 16 women gained seats in the Parliament, which is about 14 percent of the 112 elected candidates. Unfortunately, this election did not bring an increased number of women into the Parliament. With many hurdles to overcome, there is a lot of work to be done in the next five years to achieve parity for women in the next parliamentary elections.

Nigeria
Nigeria’s elections for President and National Assembly were held in April 2007 and the next scheduled elections are in 2011. Nigeria alternated between a military dictatorship and a limited democracy between 1966 and 1999.⁹ 

Human Rights Watch released a report before the April 2007 elections, which noted that the transition to civilian rule has not lead to an accountable government. Widespread violence, intimidation, bribery, vote-rigging, and corruption were rampant during the 1999 and 2003 elections. The pre-election period in April 2007 was filled with violence between the parties, leaving more than 70 people dead. The courts have been trying to enforce the constitutions and the law, unfortunately, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), has been ignoring their rulings.¹⁰ 

In 2007, nine out of 112 people elected to the Senate were women (compared to 3 in 1999 and 4 in 2003), 27 out of 360 people elected to the House of Representatives were women, including a female Speaker of the House, (compared to 13 in 1999 and 21 in 2003), five women were elected Deputy Governors, and 54 out of 990 peoples elected to State Assemblies were women (compared to 12 in 1999 and 39 in 2003).¹¹

While no women has yet to elected as governor of one of Nigeria’s states, in November 2006, Dame Virgy Etiaba, Deputy Governor of Anambra State, became the first female of governor in Nigeria. Her predecessor Mr. Obi was impeached by the State Assembly in 2006, but was reinstated 72 days later.

Another influential woman who broke taboos in Nigeria was the Hon. Patricia Udogu, member House of Representatives between 2003 and 2007, and the first woman Federal parliamentarian from Imo State in Nigeria. She was interviewed on ways to improve women’s role in Nigeria’s next elections. She stated that women’s poor record in elections is due to money politics, electoral violence, and issues of sexual discrimination and harassment. She wants women to be at the forefront of fighting corruption and bribery in elections, with campaigns run by NGOs, such as National Action Committee on Women in Politics (NACWIP), to mobilize and educate the voters. She calls for 30 percent quota of women in all of Nigeria’s political parties and for designated seats in the legislatures reserved for women.¹²

Kenya
Kenya has transitioned from a state of restricted democratic practice from 1992-2002, when it became a functioning democracy.¹³  The next scheduled parliamentary and presidential elections are in December 2007. Similar to many other countries in Africa, Kenyan women are seeking ways to improve their political representation.

In August 2007, the Kenyan Parliament geared up to vote for an amendment to the constitution that would create 50 special seats in the Parliament for women. Before the vote, women activists tried to garner support with the '1,000,000 Signatures Campaign for 50 Women's Seats in Parliament.' Unfortunately, the bill was thrown out because there was no quorum present to vote on the bill.

Currently only 12 posts in the 222-seat legislature are held by women and these posts were not filled by affirmative action. An affirmative action bill was introduced in 2000 and rejected by Kenya’s president. The National Constitutional Conference debated another affirmative action measure in 2003 and 2004, but it was rejected in a 2005 referendum.¹⁴ 

In addition to trying to advance the cause of women through affirmative action, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has tried to increase the number of women legislatures by offering financial support for women running for the Parliament. These funds are earmarked under the UN’s Gender and Governance Programme.¹⁵  Kenya also received funds from the UN’s Elections Assistance Program in 2007 to ensure a free and fair election.  

Outlook for the Future
From civil wars to military dictatorships to the development of democracies, Africa has seen many miseries that will take time to heal. From HIV-AIDs to extreme poverty, the obstacles facing Africans may seem insurmountable. Despite the hardships, women across Africa are organizing rallies and campaigns and are calling for equality in the political sphere. There have been some African countries where women have achieved success.

According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, women legislatures make up 30.4 percent of the Tanzania’s legislature, 29.8 percent of Uganda’s legislature, and over 30 percent in Burundi’s legislature.¹⁶ In Rwanda, women hold about 48 percent of the seats in the Upper House of the Legislature and about 34 percent of the seats in the Lower House.¹⁷  Rwanda and Uganda both have constitutional measures guaranteeing women’s representation in Parliament.¹⁸  Mali saw its first female candidate run for the presidential elections in April 2007. These successes are most impressive when compared to established democracies, as Rwanda leads the world for women parliamentarians, followed by Norway and Sweden.

Tools, such as affirmative action, have been extremely helpful in increasing the number of women legislators. Increasing access to education will be crucial as well to ensure there is a large enough, qualified candidate pool and to ensure an educated populace. Funds from organizations, like the UN, and from private donors can help with the finances needed to run the campaign and to help watchdog organizations uncover fraud and corruption. In the end, only through changing the mindset of the population will women achieve parity in the political sphere.