KAMPALA – Activists have decried underlying factors that still pose a threat to the attained efforts in the advancement of gender equality and empowerment of women in political, economic and social spheres.
During a media briefing on the state of women’s rights and gender equality in Uganda convened by the Uganda Women’s Network (UWONET), the Women’s Movement said that Uganda has enacted progressive legislation promoting gender equity and equality but women and girls are yet to achieve their full potential.
As part of the 5th National Women’s Week 2023 and UWONET’s 30th anniversary, the Week was organized under the theme “Women’s Organizing Reimagined! Thriving through Adversity”.
Women’s Week is a biennial event that brings together women and men from different parts of Uganda and across sectors to network, share knowledge and experiences to holistically address the multi-dimensional factors that continue to impede gender transformation and equality in Uganda.
According to them, politically, women are affected by a multiplicity of obstacles that make it hard for many of them to participate and eventually emerge victorious in elective or appointed leadership positions.
According, to the Alliance for Finance Monitoring (ACFIM) the cost of running for the position of MP costs about 500 million at a minimum. Voters want to be paid to vote for a candidate partly exacerbated by the high poverty levels in Uganda.
“In public service, women’s participation in senior management in governance is significantly limited, with gender parity yet to be attained. Out of the entire public service of over 250,000 employees, females account for only 33%,” they said.
Other critical challenges highlighted include cultural bias, lack of self-confidence and lack of resources to compete in elections but also sexual harassment of women politicians during campaigns and objectification of women’s bodies affects their esteem and discourages full participation in leadership.
In relation to health, they noted that the sector budget is below the Abuja Declaration recommendation of 15% which ultimately affects women and girls’ access to quality and affordable health care in public health facilities.
According to the Uganda Aids Commission (HIV/AIDS, fact sheet 2022), HIV prevalence increased noticeably in early adulthood, particularly among women between the ages of 15-19 and 30-34 years. This is attributed to underlying causes such as; Gender-Based Violence (GBV), low income, harmful gender norms including those that reinforce the submissive role of women, low status and unequal power relations within heterosexual relations, cross-generational sex, and concurrent partnerships which leads to increased vulnerability of women to HIV infection.
“The current teenage pregnancy rate in Uganda at 25% is the highest in East Africa and accounts for 22.3 per cent of school dropouts among girls aged between 14 to 18 years. Only 8 per cent of the girls that drop out of school are given a second chance to re-enroll and these in most cases usually perform poorly due to added responsibilities.”
They added, “The country has recorded a spike in sexual exploitation, child marriage, and teenage pregnancy among school-going age. In 2022, the police recorded a total of 1,623 cases of rape and 8,960 cases of defilement respectively. This as a result of the nationwide closure of schools and higher institutions of learning as part of the preventive measure of COVID-19.”
The Activists also decried persistent gender imbalances in land ownership. The distribution of registered land titles reveals that 69.8% (585,892) are held by men, 27% (226,811) by women, and the remaining 3.2% (26,560) includes institutions and joint ownership.
Also, they noted that women in the country are still largely excluded from financial services, with only 16% of them aged 35 financially included. “This percentage lowers among older women. Most women rely on informal lenders for their financial needs (23%) or do not borrow at all (57%).”
They re-echoed that the majority of women are engaged in unpaid domestic work. “Findings from the Gender Assessment report 2018 by UWONET indicate 43% of women in Uganda are engaged in unpaid and domestic work, as compared to 20% of men. Women dedicate an average of 7.5 hours per day to unpaid care work, whereas men spend only 2 hours per day on similar tasks.”
Recommendations
Health
- Government progressively increases the health sector budget to meet the Abuja declaration threshold of 15% from the approx. 6%.
- Government of Uganda should improve health infrastructure and provide for Health units/centers’ requisite infrastructure and equipment including those required for women with disabilities as per the guidelines for designation, establishment and upgrading of health units by the Ministry of Health.
- Ministry Health and Ministry of Education and Sports (MoES) provide youth friendly Reproductive Health Services (ARHS) across the country which address the challenges faced by young women.
Economic
- Government increases budget allocation to agriculture from the current average of 4% to 10% as provided for in the Abuja declaration. The investments in agriculture should focus on mechanization, value addition and markets for women to enhance gender equality.
- Government considers introduction of physical loans /resources to women other than cash including financing of women’s village saving and loan associations (VSLA’s) to ease access to credit for women especially in rural areas.
- Parliament reviews, amend, pass and enforce pertinent laws and economic empowerment policies for women. Amend the Land Act to provide for joint ownership of land and other productive property by spouses as family property as provided for in the land policy of 2013.
- Parliament expeditiously enacts the Marriage and Divorce Bill (2009) into law. The Bill proposes allowing married persons and those cohabiting to agree on how property will be owned during and after the relationship has been dissolved.
Political
- Government changes the electoral system from fast past the post to proportional representation. This will address some of the current challenges affecting multiparty democracy in Uganda including: commercialization of politics, bribery, violence and intimidation among others. In addition, political parties will be forced to select their best male and female candidates to contest for election. Hence improved quality of leadership.
- Government undertakes robust and targeted capacity development and training programme for women elected leaders to match up to the responsibility of office.
- Government should invest resources in civic education by Uganda Human Rights Commission and voter education by Electoral Commission in order to change the attitudes and beliefs against women’s leadership.
- Government develops a policy and guidelines with clear reporting mechanisms to protect women candidates from sexual harassment during electoral processes accompanied by deterrent measures.
