Topic: Encouraging Political Participation by Women
Country: Burkina Faso
Delegate Name: Jasmyne Bush
School: Williamston High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Burkina Faso position papers GLIMUN 2017 committees
From the local to the global level, women’s leadership and political participation are restricted. Women are underrepresented in different branches of politics such as: leading positions, the civil service, and the private sector or academia. Despite the fact that women have proven their leadership, have been agents of change, and have proved their right to participate equally in democratic governance, this is restriction still occurs. Women face many obstacles of participating in political life. Things like discriminatory laws and institutions still limit women's options to run for office. Capacity gaps mean women are less likely to have the education, contacts, and resources needed to become the successful leaders they could be. For women as a whole, the playing fields need to be level, opening more opportunities for everyone and not just men. Burkina Faso has been independent. Women won the right to universal in 1956, with the adoption of the Framework Law. Nonetheless, women's access to the legislature has been slow and has even been limited even after independence. It was not until 2000 that a woman assumed the position of chairperson of a legislative committee, when one was designated to chair the Committee on Employment and Social and Cultural Affairs. In the socio-cultural traditions of Burkina Faso, women are mostly seen as inferior to men. Numerous women have now convinced themselves that they do not have the right to participate in public decision making. The alternative of this is that women conform to “viruses” such as obedience and submission. This is mostly taught at a young age in their upbringing. Certain actions that the government has taken have been insufficient .The government needs to start making courageous decisions to examine the possibility of imposing a quota of women on the parties’ electoral lists, as a medium-term goal. The government should also study the effects of the different counting methods on the political representation of women in the elected bodies , so to consider adjusting or modifying the electoral system. The political parties should take action themselves and designate more women to their decision-making bodies. This way the have the opportunity to see to it that the quota of women is respected and not tarnished. For women, certain women activists and women with responsibility in politics should take it upon themselves to help women who have yet to overcome this struggle to do so. This could potentially give the women the confidence they are now lacking with a new vibrant confidence they can now tackle these obstacles with. To this end, it will be necessary to integrate in all literacy and training programmes, and to develop new advocacy strategies. In order for their to be women in the national legislature, synergy is needed among the government, the deputies, and the women’s organization. The state of Burkina Faso has to play a major role because public authority is vested in it – it has the political, legislative, judicial, and economic power to make all decisions capable of promoting women’s rights.
