Women in Parliament: ‘Gender equality in politics crucial to democracy and SDGs’

Speakers at the 136th assembly of Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) in Dhaka on Saturday stressed the need for increasing women’s participation in politics, empowering girls and making parliaments more gender-sensitive ones.

The five-day IPU assembly is being held at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in the capital, where speakers stressed on the participation of women in all spheres of society including politics, governance and financial sectors must be ensured to end gender inequalities.

Programme Officer of Gender Partnership Programme of IPU Zeina Hilal, who spoke on achieving gender equality and parity in the parliament also said “The global average of the women in national parliament is 23.3% up from 22.6% a year ago,” adding at this pace it would take another 50 years to reach gender parity in parliament.

“A study by the IPU in October 2016 reveals that sexism, harassment and violence against women MPs are global problems that impede gender equality and undermine the foundations of democracy,” she added.

The five-day long assembly will focus on taking decisive actions to end the rising social, political and economic inequalities and not to interfere internal affairs of states in the present global context.

The theme of this year’s IPU Assembly is-’Redressing Inequalities: Delivering on Dignity and well being for all will be discussed by a total of 1,348 delegates including 650 parliament members, 53 speakers, deputy speakers and 209 women parliamentarians of 131 countries.

Source: Dhaka Tribune