Lip Service vs Service Delivery

Gender issues are still excluded in political agendas. This means that women are often left out in political debates and issues that they face are neglected. A look through the political parties’ agenda, one cannot help but notice that the gender element is obscure. By this I mean issues affecting women are not given the attention they need and that the issue of representation is not dealt with.

As part of the millennium development goals, gender equality is mentioned as a key area to achieve other development goals. To reach the millennium goals, politicians need to have clear strategies targeted at women and girls, and address issues they face.

The ANC in its manifesto, states that 30% of all their parliamentarians, provincial
Legislature members and councillors are women and 43% in cabinet. They also say that they strive for a 50% by 2009 and that this will be done through their policies.

What is the use of having gender-sensitive policies, when there is evident lack of service delivery, when ordinary women still cannot access healthcare facilities? Statistics still show that women are still not getting good service when reporting cases of rape and abuse. Implementation of progressive policies has been uneven and high levels of unemployment, HIV/AIDS and sexual violence have equated to an assault on South African women which government structures and policies have battled to respond to, and in some areas have perpetuated.

South Africans now find themselves having to battle with economic recession facing the world and that means more burden on women as they still remain more vulnerable of the working population in terms of disadvantages in accessing labour markets. On a world scale, the majority of the 1.3 billion people living in poverty are women. The vulnerability of women to poverty is strongly linked to the gender division of labour in paid and unpaid work. Its is then against this economic backdrop that we need to have policies that not only stimulates a sustainable economic recovery, but that also empower women and strive for gender equity in all spheres.

Not much is being said by the political parties in their manifestos about steering a shift in the economy and balancing the gender scales. Part of progress to achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is to give focus on public job creation as a policy option toward that end.

On the other hand, the Democratic Alliance (DA) as the official opposition does not offer any gender focused programmes. Though this party is led by a woman, their manifesto does not have any gender-sensitive programmes. Although they states that they are striving for an “open society” they fail dismally in their programmes to link this to the empowerment of women. To achieve this caring, safe and efficient society that the DA refers to in their manifesto, you need to have a gender equality approach to realize it.

In their manifestos, most political parties acknowledge the issue of violence against women and children as being a key problem. A look through the Inkatha Freedom Party’s (IFP) manifesto, the issue of violence against women is mentioned and it is refered to as being wrong behaviour. The IFP does not come up with any gender specific programmes to deal with violence against women and children, and we are tired of lip service instead of delivery.

One cannot help but wonder how the Congress of the People (COPE) would implement their programmes should they be in power. This is a party with one of the glowing manifestos, from a gender perspective. In their manifesto, COPE not only commit themselves to enhance the gains made in the empowerment of women to achieve gender equality; they state that they will establish a Women’s Development Fund to focus on funding and assisting women to engage in productive economic activity. In a country riddled with slow or lack of service delivery in some areas, one wonders how this women’s development fund will be linked to practical issues. Will it be designed as a “poverty alleviation” programme that is tailored for women? We need sustainable programmes that speak to issues faced by women at all levels.

We still have women walking long distances to access healthcare facilities, to fetch water and in some cases a girl child still has to walk long distances to school. These are the basic rights enshrined in our constitution that COPE claims to want to defend.

A lack of gender specific programmes in the Independent Democrats (ID) manifesto is striking. Again, it proves that having a woman leader does not guarantee a “women inclusive approach” to policies. The ID promises to continue to fight for the realisation of constitutional rights, especially those of the poor, people with disabilities, women and children. They acknowledge the Commission on Gender Equality (CGE) as an institution that acts as a watchdog of our constitution, but this is not linked to any clear programmes striving for gender equality.

At a glance all the political parties sing a very melodious tune but will this translate to implementation of the policies stipulated in their manifestos? Women in South Africa still need to have their needs met, and the needs of women are different to those of men. We need practical solutions, and to quote the UDM leader, Bantu Holomisa: “we need to put down the machine gun, and take up the laptop and calculators”.

Indeed, the challenges are at all levels, most of all at the economic level. The leader of the ANC youth league, Julius Malema has been saying we need a revolution. Perhaps he needs to revisit this, and look which sectors of our society need to be revolutionized. We need a revolution in pushing the gender agenda at all sphere. Young political leaders need to begin talking the language of the youth of South Africa, and that means being relevant in their strategies to address issues faced by young people.

Through this website, Women'sNet will provide information to fill the gap in political debates and dialogue, and a platform for communication and engagement in the lead up to the national elections in 2009.

This platform will enable women to articulate their concerns, discuss issues of concern to them, and collaborate to level the playing field in the political landscape. In addition, this website also creates opportunities to assess political parties' commitment to the ideals of gender equality in a practical way. Women'sNet encourages critical debate on issues affecting women, thus allowing meaningful interrogation of commitments made on paper.