Portfolio Committee on Women’s Affairs, Gender and Community Development Chairperson, Biata Beatrice Nyamupinga has pledged war in parliament as Zimbabwe’s gender remains high in Zimbabwe. Nyamupinga was speaking during the Zimbabwe Gender Commission inaugural National Gender Forum in Harare today.
The Gender Portfolio Committee chairperson said that Zimbabwe Gender Commission has a lot of work to do to reduce inequality between men and women.
“Isu se commission ticharwa kuti government budget iyise mari yakawanda ku gender commission” (We as the Portfolio Committee on Women’s Affairs, Gender and Community Development shall fight for more money to be allocated to the Zimbabwe Gender Commission) said Nyamupinga.
The National Gender Forum is being done with the main objective to define strategic actions needed to fully support women and men’s equal participation in socio-economic and political spheres.
Chairperson of the Zimbabwe Gender Commission, Commissioner M. M Mukahanana-Sungaruve, who was giving welcome remarks for the ongoing forum said that with regards to economic empowerment, women still remain at the bottom of the economic ladder.
“Economic empowerment means women having access to income at household level, ownership of productive resources such as land and other assets,have own savings and have access to credit” said Mukahanana-Sungaruve.
“According to the research done out in 2015, out of 64 Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of companies listed on the stock exchange (Zimbabwe Stock Exchange), only 3 CEOs were females (4.68% ) and out of the 103 CEOs of state owned parastatals there were only 15 female CEOs.”
A study commissioned by Mckinsey Global Institute in 2015 notes that advancing women’s equality could add $12 trillion to global growth over the next decade according to the Gender Commissioner.
Zimbabwe Gender Commission is a constitutional body that is meant to ensure that gender equality is achieved and promoted in terms of Section 245 of the country’s constitution.
The body is holding a two-day inaugural National Gender Forum which is being attended by parliamentarians, representatives from the United Nations and civic society groups.