Revised Draft How to Achieve Gender Sensitive Parliament in Bangladesh: Highlight Gender Inequality Issues and Suggest Strategic Intervention for Gender Equitable Outcome in the Parliament Prepared by Md Osman Ali, Retired Joint Chief, Planning Commission Dhaka, Bangladesh 10-c/5 Madrasa Road bi lane, Block F, Mohammapur , Dhaka 1207 Tel: 8110232, Cell : 01191325662, e-mail:[email protected] Original draft; December 28.2014 Latest draft; 26 July , 2015 Further Revised 10 September.2015 1 Contents 0.0 Abstract 3 1.0 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 3 2.0 Objective and Methodology of the Study ................................................................................. 3 3.0 Women’s Participation in Parliament ....................................................................................... 4 4.0 Gender Equality through Leadership Position and Standing Committe .................................. 9 5.0 Gender Equality through Legislation and Debate .................................................................. 15 6.0. Gendermainsreaming through Parliamentary Mechanisms .................................................... 18 7.0 Men’s Responsibility for Gender Equality ............................................................................. 22 8.0 Gender-Sensitive Policy Framework for Parliament .............................................................. 22 9.0 Political Parties’ Responsibility in Gender Mainstreaming .................................................... 25 10.0 Gender Sensitive Parliamentary Culture and Infrastructure .................................................. 27 11.0 Gender equality issues in Parliament Secretariat ................................................................. 31 12.0 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................. 33 13.0 References Annexure A 2 Abstract The study examines gender sensitivity of Bangladesh Parliament and shows women’s low representation in the parliament, its leadership position and committees. The study demonstrate social, economic, political and legal issues that hinder mainstreaming gender in legislation, parliamentary mechanism, policy framework, infrastructure, culture, secretariat, political party and men’s responsibility for gender equality etc. Hence the study advocates strategic interventions to address the issues which include adoption of Proportional Representation along with First-Past-the-Post electoral system to increase women representation, amendment of outdated gender related law to protect women rights, introduction of a guideline to examine bills and budget in gender perspective, empowerment of committee on women to mobilize other committee for inclusion of gender issues in their agenda. The study also emphasizes to have gender responsive Rules of Procedure of the Parliament, women’s friendly parliamentary policy framework, gender sensitive parliamentary culture, infrastructure, political institution, and partnership of both men and women law maker and gender management system in parliament secretariat etc Introduction The word ‘parliament’ itself is derived from the Latin word ‘parliamentum’ and the French word ‘parler’ and originally meant a talk; and talking is, of course, what Parliaments do most of the time1. Parliament generally refers to a legislature within a Westminster-style of parliamentary government, a system which has influenced the development of representative assemblies in many countries of the world. Hence Parliament is a representative assembly, usually associated with national government, where parliamentarians meet to enact, amend and repeal laws for state. Parliament observes and steer governing actions and usually have exclusive authority to amend the budget or budgets involved in the process2. A parliamentary system is a model of democratic governance of a state in which the executive branch derives its democratic legitimacy from, and is held accountable to the parliament; the executive and legislative branches are thus interconnected system. Bangladesh has a parliamentary system of government. The term ‘Parliament’ adopts many widely different names: Jatiya Sangsad in Bangladesh, congress in the United States, Duma of Russia, Diet of Japan, National People’s Congress of China, the Knesset of Israel and Sansad in India. A gender-sensitive3 parliament is founded on the principle of gender equality– that is, that both men and women have an equal right to participate in its structures and processes, without discrimination and without recrimination. Parliaments that are gender-sensitive have no barriers to women’s full participation and set a positive example (or role model) to society at large.4 A gender-sensitive parliament is able to ensure women’s full participation and equality between parliamentarians and promote gender equality and women’s empowerment in socio-economic and political process. The Strategic intervention for achievement of a gender-sensitive parliament are course of actions through which parliament obtains, strengthens, and maintains the capabilities to set and achieve its objectives of equal rights, responsibilities and opportunities of men and women over time in its structure and operation without discrimination. 2.0 Objective and Methodology of the Study Objective of the study • to investigate the gender sensitivity of parliament in terms of its operational and institutional culture and identify gender difference and inequality and issues/challenges in women’s participation and gender equality between men and women parliamentarians • to present a specific range of strategic intervention to address the challenges to make parliament a best gender-sensitive institutions and effectively mainstream gender into its work and set a positive example to society at large. 1 Sapra N.K 2005, P 1 2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legislature retrieved dated 9/3/2014. 3 Gender Sensitivity means being aware of why men and women behave differently and understanding their need and concern 4 IPU, 2008, p. 61). 3 Methodology of the study The research is mainly based on the secondary information of relevant books, Journals, Government circulars, research reports etc. As this mainly is a qualitative research it is relied on desktop and internet research. National and international journals and reports especially that of Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) on gender are major source to bring together relevant information and data for research. In addition, primary data was also collected from informal discussions with officers belonging to Parliament and Election Commission. 3.0 Women’s Participation in Parliament Women around the world at every socio-political level find themselves underrepresented in parliament. In 2013, women held 21 per cent of parliamentary seats worldwide5. In regional countries average of women representation in parliament in America is 22.2%, in Europe excluding Nordic countries is 20.2% and in Asia is 18%6 . Women in the Nordic countries where women friendly politics exists win greater representation (42.1 %)7 in the parliament. In Rwanda, women enjoy a parliamentary majority (56.4 %)8 in the world while it is about 20% in Bangladesh in 2014. That is women’ in the Bangladesh parliament had not reached the 30 percent that is recognized as the critical mass9 for change in parliament The parliament of Bangladesh contains 350 seats for Members of Parliament or MP, including 50 seats reserved for women. The constitution provided a quota of 15 women’s reserved seats in 1973 which was subsequently increased through constitutional amendments and now stands at 50 in 2013 . Despite these facts, women still remain the most under-represented group (20%) in the parliament. The number of women directly elected has been painfully low, i.e. from 0.7 percent in second parliament to a maximum of 6.3 percent in 2014 in tenth Parliament. The ninth and tenth parliament respectively registered a progress with 18.55 Percent and 20 percent directly elected women members. Table 1: Women’s Representation in the Parliament Number No of No of % Women % of Women Number and General Reserved Women in General in Parliament Years of the Seats in Seat for in General seat 2+3 Parliament Parliament women Seats 1 2 3 4 5 6 1st 1973-75 300 15 0 0 4.8 2nd 1979-82 300 30 2 0 .7 9.7 3rd 1986-87 300 30 5 1.7 10.60 4th 1988-90 300 0 4 1.3 1.3 5th 1991 -95 300 30 4 1.3 10..3 6th 1996-96 300 30 6 2.00 11.00 7th 1996-01 300 30 8 2.6 11.50 8th 2001-06 300 45 5 1.7 14.50 9th 2008-13 300 45* 19 6.3 18.55 10th 2014 - 300 50 19 6.3 19.71 * Note: Fifteen amendment of the constitution increases reserved seat of women to 50 Source: According to Panday (2008) for first to eighth parliaments; authors’ calculation for the ninth and tenth parliament 5 Ballington, Julie and Kahane, Muriel 2014 Page 3 6 IPU Report,2011 page,10 7 Ibid 8 Women in National Parliaments http://www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm retrieved on 2/2/2015 9 The Critical Mass theory anticipates that an increase in the number of women will lead to greater substantive representation 4 3.1. Factors Affecting Women’s Political Participation 3.1.0 Electoral systems First-past-the-post (FPTP) is an electoral system in which each area (constituency) elects one MP from a choice of candidates. Voters can only vote for one candidate and the candidate that gets the most votes becomes the