By Bertha Badu-Agyei
Accra, Sept. 24, GNA-The Network for Women’s Rights (NETRIGHT) together with the Affirmative Action Law Coalition (AALC) have rejected some government decisions on the Constitutional Review Committee (CRC) report on gender equality and other matters demands Stronger Gender Protections.
In a consolidated position paper issued in Accra, after a consultative meeting, the group, insisted that key provisions on gender equality, land rights and natural resources be strengthened before any constitutional amendment took effect.
This response followed government’s modification of various CRC recommendations across 14 priority areas arguing that many of Governments ‘accepted positions’ leave women and persons with disabilities exposed to continued discrimination.
NETRIGHT has proposed reforms to Article 22 to ensure equitable distribution of marital property, arguing that courts’ longstanding “substantial contribution” test has disadvantaged women whose contributions often take the form of unpaid domestic labour.
They want a broader structural demanding that disability inclusion and gender-responsive governance be treated as cross-cutting constitutional principles binding on all branches and levels of government, rather than confined to a single chapter of the CRC report.
Madam Janet Akakpo who made the presentation noted that their various proposals would ensure gender and disability considerations were embedded in budgeting, planning, and resource governance decisions nationwide, rather than left to piecemeal legislation.
The AALC called on the government to immediately extend proportional representation to all 276 existing parliamentary seats, rather than confining it to an additional 24 seats as currently proposed, while also entrenching a minimum 30 per cent quota for women in both Parliament and district assemblies.
Mrs Sheila Minka-Premo, Convenor of the AALC, cited that the government’s decision to add 24 seats to parliament and be shared among persons with disabilities, youth and women for instance, would not address the gender inequality in parliament.
“Calculated, women would get only eight seats representing 2.7 percent out of the 24 additional seats of an expanded 300-member house which is far short of the 90 seats needed to reach the 30 percent gender threshold”.
She cited historical data showing women’s representation had never exceeded 20 percent since independence standing at 9.6 percent in 1960 and currently at about 14.6 percent with 41 women parliamentarians out of 276 elected in 2024.
The government had proposed expanding Parliament to 300 members, made up of 276 directly elected constituency seats and 24 additional seats to be filled through proportional representation among women, persons with disabilities and the youth.
At the local level, the Coalition described the situation as more severe, noting that women’s representation in District Assemblies had stayed below 10 per cent in every election since 1994, falling to about 4.1 per cent in 2023, when only 269 of nearly 6,300 elected members were women despite 1,049 women contesting.
It called for the one-third appointed component of District Assemblies be used immediately to boost women’s numbers ahead of the 2027 District Assembly elections.
On the government’s proposal to have District Chief Executives elected, with at least two of five presidential nominees required to be women, the coalition cautioned that nomination and shortlisting do not amount to actual representation and called for mechanisms to monitor real outcomes for women in those elections.
The women’s group concluded that Ghana’s constitutional review offered a rare chance to move women’s political equality from an aspiration to an enforceable guarantee, insisting that proportional representation, constitutional quotas and the Affirmative Action (Gender Equity) Act, 2024, must work together rather than in isolation to close a representation gap that has persisted since independence.
GNA
Edited by Linda Asante Agyei
Reporter: Bertha Badu Agyei