Youth Activist, Nana Akua Afriyie Busia has attributed the gender disparity in public service and politics to the lack of preparedness on the part of the female gender for roles in the various sectors of public service and politics.
According to the Youth Activist, most women who aspire for political positions and positions in high offices of decision-making do not make any effort to acquire the necessary skills and knowledge that will make them suitable for such positions.
This, she said, is because those women erroneously believe they are entitled to such positions regardless of their competence since there are deliberate policies to increase the number of women in public service and politics and thus, they are unable to beat competition from their male counterparts so as to occupy higher public and political offices.
Miss Busia dismissed the assertion that the social, economic and political gender imbalance is solely to blam on the African and for that matter the Ghanaian sociocultural systems and norms.
“I think the major challenge with women going into politics is the gender issue where people believe because they are female, automatically, they should be given a table. It is not that women are being prevented but women are not preparing to get there because of our understanding that if a party is supposed to select 10 people, automatically women will be given a slot but the question is, have these women prepared themselves for the opportunities?” she squeezed in a discussion on Strong and Sassy on Accra-based Joy FM.
Miss Busia added that even those who are fortunate to be offered key decision-making positions in politics and public service find it difficult to excel since they are not equipped with the requisite knowledge and skills.
“I think what happens is that women just go into politics without any preparation and they get there and they are hit by the hard reality. That’s when they get stranded,” she added.
While acknowledging the competence of women in holding higher positions in government and politics, she asserted that politics and other social and economic spheres are continually dominated by men because women have not positioned themselves in ways that will make them competitive.
“I’m not disputing the strength of women because there are women whom I meet and I feel these are the best of human resources we could have. But there are others who carry their gender on their heads and they feel they are women going into politics so they should be given an opportunity,” she argued.
Ghana has, since independence, taken a number of steps aimed at increasing women’s participation in key decision-making positions especially in governance. However, these measures the country has taken are yet to yield the needed results.
But some gender activists believe the only way of addressing the gender imbalance in the country is the passage of the Affirmative Action which has been in the pipeline since 1998.
