According to research conducted by the World Economic Forum, it will take 98 years to close the gender parity gap in sub-Saharan Africa, and more than 130 years to achieve this goal globally.
What’s more, with 2022 giving way to a range multi-layered and compounding crises – including the rising cost of living, the ongoing effects of the pandemic, the climate emergency, and large-scale conflict and displacement – these figures are at risk of stalling, with some analysts warning that a lack of action could even result in a reversal of gender parity in Africa and abroad.
Heeding their caution, the former under-secretary-general of UN Women and former deputy president of South Africa, Dr Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, believes that more accountability should be placed on the roles and responsibilities of men, and that they should be held more liable for realising gender equality in the African continent.
Dr Mlambo-Ngcuka says: “Gender inequality is a man’s problem and women should not be held accountable for closing the gap. I say this because the divides we see in working environments can be attributed to policymakers, who are largely men, and so that’s where the change should begin. We ought to be moving towards a situation where there are more men taking an extensive interest in gender equality.”
She shared these thoughts during a keynote speech delivered at the Standard Bank Top Women’s Conference, explaining that South Africa has established itself as a front runner on the continent with respect to advancing the rights, roles and contributions of women to society.
“Preceded by the fearlessness of the women who fought against Apartheid, South Africa cemented its position globally after the 1995 Beijing Conference, where for the first time, 105 countries met to deliberate on gender equality. It was here that the governments of the world recognised women’s rights as human rights, and raised the need for women’s representation and participation in decision-making.”
From this gathering, Dr Mlambo-Ngcuka recalls how the South African leadership at the time set targets and commitments to expand the involvement of women in decision-making bodies, and to prevent public institutions from making decisions about women without any women present in the room.
Since then, she notes that South Africa has made good – albeit not enough – progress towards closing the national gender parity gap, with Statistics South Africa recording higher levels of literacy amongst women, as well as improved earnings for women over the 25-year period since the Beijing Conference. However, she also admitted that men by and large still dominate decision-making bodies, and that more needs to be done to increase women’s involvement in the upper echelons of the public and private sectors.
To this end, Dr Mlambo-Ngcuka believes that international organisations such as UN Women play an important role in accelerating women’s empowerment and achieving gender equality in Africa. In particular, these bodies can speed the development and adoption of novel legislation, to tackle discriminatory laws and enshrine the rights of women at the national level.
In doing so, she feels that international organisations should also partner with like-minded stakeholders with a vested interest in advancing women’s contributions, to pool resources and amplify the sharing of knowledge, networks and opportunities for women.
“The partnership between UN Women, Standard Bank and Topco Media to host this year’s Top Women Conference is a great example of this – together, they’ve created a platform where vested players can align, share, recognise and celebrate the contributions of leading women on the African continent. Now, we must extend this collaboration to organisations such as Girls Who Code, Bright Pink, Days for Girls, and the Malala Fund, who are just a few other examples of stakeholders that prioritise gender equality,” says Dr Mlambo-Ngcuka.