EOC calls for more women in senior govt positions
We must invest in leadership as women. We are tired of women working for more than 30 years and retire into poverty.
Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) has re-echoed an appeal for more women to be offered opportunity to serve in senior public service positions.
According to the Commission chairperson, Sylvia Ntambi Muwebwa, it is not yet a reality for gender equality in public service or administration in Uganda.
"Women are not yet participating equally with men," Ntambi said.
The report the Commission outed in 2018, revealed that in the 21 ministries considered for the study, women hold 25.6% of the top management positions.
These include permanent secretaries, directors, undersecretaries, commissioners and assistant commissioners.
On the middle level management positions the research disclosed that the composition of women was only 33.3% and 43% of the lower ranking positions.
The report also affirmed that men dominate employment positions at senior decision making levels in the public sector.
"In a follow-up to the findings of the said study, the EOC under the Women in Public Sector (WiPS) project is here now to build the capacity of women in the public sector and enable them to take lead in articulating and providing solutions to their own challenges," she said.
WiPS is a one year project which is being implemented in a consortium of the EOC, the Forum for Women in Democracy (FOWEDE), Uganda Women's Network (UWONET) and Femme Forte (FF).
This is under a project titled, empowerment of duty bearers and women in the public sector in Uganda supported by Robert Botch Foundation (RBF).
"I want to emphasize that inclusive development calls for equitable access and participation of women at all levels.
We therefore need to rethink the gender discourse by ensuring the women in the leadership and management positions have the requisite capacity to champion the promotion and protection of their rights and most importantly to guard their space jealously," he said.
For Uganda, the global gender index (2020) is 0.717, but the country still performs poorly on political empowerment at 0.31, relatively well on economic participation and opportunity at 0.82 and well on health survival 1.00 and education attainment at 1.29.
Solome Nakaweesi a feminist for the last 30 years and the country representative of Robert Botch Foundation said; "We must invest in leadership as women. We are tired of women working for more than 30 years and retire into poverty." She added; "When women raise, the whole of society rises."
The director of gender at the gender ministries, Jane Mpagi, on what are the rights of women in public service, said "no one should be denied a job on the basis of being a woman."
Women are entitled to safe and healthy working environment on top of enjoying a balanced life," she said.
She added that they have a right to legal contracts, equal pay and bodily integrity.
"They must be free from sexual violence at work place," she said.
There are several local and international legal frameworks that call for elimination of all forms of discrimination on the basis of gender including the Constitution of Uganda, Convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (CEDAW), and International Bill on the Rights for Women, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) among others.