NEWS
Election results put more women in parliament

April 17 2004 at 12:06PM

The number of women in the new South African parliament is set to increase from 120 to 131, a 10 percent increase, Gender Links said in a statement on Saturday.

According to the organisation, this will result in an overall proportion of 32,8 percent women in parliament compared to 30 percent in 1997.
South Africa will now move up in the global ranking of women in parliament from fifteenth to eleventh place, coming after Austria and slightly ahead of Germany.
Rwanda, with 49 percent of its parliament made up of women, is in the lead position in the global league.
South Africa will also now move to first position in the Southern African Development Community ranking of women in parliament, with Mozambique and Seychelles close behind at 30 percent and 29,4 percent respectively.
According to Gender Links, the main reason for the increase in women's representation in the 2004 South African elections is the African National Congress's higher majority, with the number of ANC women up from 96 in 1999 to 104 in the new parliament.
The ANC is the only political party with a quota for women.
Although women made a much stronger showing on the lists of opposition parties this year, the total number of women opposition MPs is only set to increase from 24 in 1994 to 27 in the new parliament, according to the statement. This reflects the fact that women in opposition parties are often not strategically placed on lists, a critical factor for parties that only gained a few seats.
According to Gender Links attention will now be focused on the new cabinet. "We hope that President Thabo Mbeki will use this opportunity - one that is entirely in his hands - to increase the representation of women in this top decision-making post from its current level of thirty percent to gender parity." - Sapa

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