Women's empowerment in Uganda is an "irreversible process," and according to Mr. Richard Kaijuka, Minister of Planning and Economic Development, the constitutional requirement that one-third of all local council members be women is a "revolutionary departure from the past." Before, "you wouldn't have a single woman, by the nature of our tradition, with men being chauvinistic and women also being shy to come forward when their husbands are there." Now, at district level, women stand alongside men for parliament, "and we gave extra seats for women's representation up to national level."
Interviewed during the ECA conference, Mr. Kaijuka explained that "we had to do this deliberately so we could kick-start the empowerment process. A society has to meaningfully empower, not just talk about it." The "educated and broad-based" leadership also realized that "in order to mobilize the masses, women had to be at centre-stage. And for women to be fully committed, we had to empower them. So it was a mutually reinforcing need."
Another important move was Ms. Wandira Specioza Kazibwe's appointment as Vice-President. "She is a gynaecologist, a consultant, a professional in her own right. She has now become a role model." Noting that there are other women in the cabinet, that the head of the civil service is a woman, and that there are senior women in the parastatals, Mr. Kaijuka says that "even if it is not 50-50 yet," women's representation is well advanced.
Any resentment among men might be "among individuals who keep it quiet." If anything, there are "some extremist women who, instead of building on the strengths of what we have created, come forward and say, before you form a cabinet, we must have 50 or 60 per cent women." He warns against "demanding the unreasonable" from the start, because "this can make others jittery about the process."
Mr. Kaijuka says progress is slow in producing gender-disaggregated data for planning and budgetary purposes, noting the scarcity of accurate and reliable statistics in most African countries. Uganda's parliament has just made the Statistical Bureau an autonomous body "to come to grips with statistical problems" and "we are also going to carry out district resource endowment profiles that will incorporate women's issues and figures."
He declares that conditions for Ugandan women are gradually improving. Reasons for this include the stable macro-economic framework and economic liberalization, along with the feeder and trunk road programme, which have enabled women's agricultural output to be brought to market and sold at better prices. The universal primary education programme is another factor producing a situation in which "a woman right deep in the village has seen a change overnight." He recalls the past when "these women would grow coffee and other produce with nobody to buy it. They were discouraged. So the minute you improve all that, you are enhancing and empowering them through income. The minute you earn more income through your own sweat, and the minute you see your children going to school when before you couldn't pay for it, you tell me how you feel." He said the road programme has "opened up the country more than ever before." And with the entire economic environment liberalized, "those who are dynamic producers have never had it any better."
