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What do women voters want?
2005-07-10 10:52:09
By Lawi Joel
As the nation moves towards the general elections scheduled for October, election fever is growing everyday , with only four months remaining to elect new leaders for the fourth phase government; those aspiring for various leadership positions are busy preparing themselves on how to convince their voters, while voters, especially women, talk about how these leaders would impact on their day to day lives . Our Staff Writer MATILDA Kasanga listens to the women’s voices.
The power of the ballot, is common knowledge to all of us. The ballot is a powerful tool for change.
The quality of life for all can be improved greatly if the ballot rather than the bullet is used. Both practical, short-term changes as well as strategic, long-term changes can be brought about through the wise use of the ballot.
Mwanaisha Adullah, (25) a Tabata resident, says Tanzanian women make up the majority of the voters. They can boast of, and use the power they have in numbers to choose leaders who can bring change as far as women’s welfare is concerned.
“ I have always thought how women voters could change things in this country if only they were determined and organized.
We are the majority and that is our strength. We have the power to vote out leaders whom we think have not taken women issues seriously in the last five year” says Mwanaisha.
Women have enormous problems in this country which need committed leadership to solve. Mwanaisha says women, especially low income earners, still face problems when trying to access loans to run their businesses.
The loans which are available are only accessible to wives of “well to do people” It’s a paradox, Mwanaisha says.
“Those women whose husbands are able and can access loans easily are the very ones benefiting from the small loans which are meant for poor people like myself”
Women want peace. Peace implies the absence of violence.
Peace without justice is not durable and amounts to oppression. Every day women and girls are beaten up, sometimes seriously, by their husbands, partners, lovers, brothers and fathers.
The majority of women still bear this violation in silence even though the constitution and laws of Tanzania make violence against others an offence.
“We keep silent because we do not know the law, or because we have been taught that a good woman does not complain and should bear hardships cheerfully, or because we fear that the police will take our complaints as just a domestic matter,” says Mary Mwande, a gender activist in the city.
Forced, or early marriages are still common in many parts of the country. Parents sometimes take their daughters out of school to marry them off, even when they have not reached puberty.
Female Genital Mutilation still persists in many regions and this tradition affects a large number of young girls in terms of education and their freedom.
According to the Demographic Health Survey carried out in 1996, more than 18 percent of women in Tanzania have undergone FGM. Arusha and Manyara are leading with 81 percent, while Dodoma and Mara follow with 76 and 43 percent respectively.
Female Genital Mutilation is very dangerous to the health of women and girls and is a violation of their basic human rights. In this situation, Ms. Mwande says women voters should lobby for legal education for all women to enable them understand their rights.
Deus Kibamba, Programme Officer with the Tanzania Gender Networking Programme (TGNP), says “First and foremost women need democracy.
Women have their own different meaning for democracy” They want democracy whereby every Tanzanian can access resources. Related to that, they want a social services provision system that guarantees women and the young access to social services.
Women also want the opening up of the political and economic system in the country for them to be able not only to vote for other people but also to be voted into various leadership positions. They are tired of being just voters and campaigners. They now want to enjoy their right to vote and be voted for.
Women also want a halt to the partriachal political system, which only favours men for leadership positions. They want rules of political elections to be adhered to so that the election is free and fair.
“We know women have championed peace; the peace we are talking about does not only mean absence of war but also availability of basic necessities,” asserts Kibamba.
In a recently launched women’s voters manifesto, women have proclaimed that the first guarantor of food security would be harnessing of agriculture.
Agriculture must be strengthened to increase food production and thereby ensure food security. The coming government should continue to support free and informed discussion of issues relating to the violation of the human rights of women and girls.
Women voters would also like to see members of the law enforcement agencies are educated so that they do not ignore cases of violence brought before them, or delay them in the process of seeking justice.
The issue of health is critical to Tanzanian women. The health of women is important for the entire nation, Yet there are a number of problems that women’s health is facing.
Many women continue to die during in childbirth. Such deaths could be prevented by proper and timely medical care. Statistics from the Ministry of Health show that maternal and child deaths are actually going up! In fact they are neither meeting government or international targets.
Death of mothers due to complications in pregnancy have also sharply increased. The Head of Reproductive and Child Health Services, Dr. Catherine Sanga, was recently quoted as saying the situation is worse in rural areas where health facilities are not well established.
Dr. Sanga says the underlying causes of preventable maternal deaths include lack of skilled birth attendants, poor quality of essential obstetric care, poor referral mechanisms and lack of awareness of danger signs of obstetric emergency.
However, gender and human rights activists still insist the government has not done enough to rectify the situation as far as maternal deaths are concerned.
In the manifesto, the activists further argue that the increase in infant mortality, due to the absence of primary health care, is cruelty against children and is a violation of the fundamental right to life.
Hence the activists call on the coming government to ensure that children have the right to live. Some of the demands stipulated in the manifesto include:
They want those vying for various posts in the elections to convince them that they would be able translate into action the effective participation of women in national leadership and that special strategies would be prepared to assist women participate in various national leadership; and that the 50 per cent (of women) requirement reached by the African Union should not be confined to MPs and councilors, but should include all categories of national leadership.
lThe new government should from time to time review the laws in the constitution which legalize gender inequality.
lThe same thing should be done in respect of laws and policies that guide the country in the fight against poverty to ensure that they take into account, on an equal footing, the demands of women, children, men and youth so that the each group enjoys, equally, our national resources.
The forthcoming government ought to realize that the participation of women in national leadership is not only their right, but that that right is enshrined in the Constitution sections 9, 21 and 22, and that strategies to enable women to participate in national leadership should be set up by working out short and long term goals.
The government should also realize that a government budget that does not take into account gender equality, at the end of the day, ends up giving women, especially poor women and girls, a heavy burden when taking care of their respective households.
Lack of employment for young men and women is a result of the kind of economic system we have, and is set to lead to the underdevelopment of our economy, and these kind of policies are in the long run, destructive as they don’t protect the Tanzanian. This development is a violation of fundamental human rights on employment.
What kind of a leader?
The activists in their manifesto have laid down the following yardstick for those who would be nominated by their respective parties to run for various posts in the forthcoming elections.
The leader must be a man/woman of integrity, who respects himself/herself and other people without bias to class, gender, religion, tribe or ideology,
lShould be a patriot and a person ready to defend all Tanzanians, women, men, children and youth,
He or she should not be an avaricious person given to misuse of public property, especially property the creation of which he or she has not toiled for.
He or she should be sober, patient and a fighter for justice.
He or she should not be a person given to harassing any class of people in society, especially women, children and poor men anywhere from the ward level to any place of work.
lHe or she should be a hard worker, who has the ability to entice the citizenry in the war against poverty, the spread of HIV/AIDS and ignorance. He or she should be an educated person with wisdom, and who is ready to develop himself and the nation at large.
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