EQUAL GENDER REPRESENTATION and PARTICIPATION IN LOCAL GOVERNMENT

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EQUAL GENDER REPRESENTATION and PARTICIPATION IN
LOCAL GOVERNMENT
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BACKGROUND

• SALGA is a body endorsed by the South African
  Constitution and is the recognized VOICE of Local
  government.
• SALGA is a voluntary organisation and obtains its
  funding from membership levies, government grant
  and donor funding.
• SALGA has nine provincial associations led
  politically by the provincial chairperson and
  administratively by the deputy CEO.
• SALGA has a total membership of all 284
  municipalities.
• SALGA is the employer body and represents 8 824
  councillors and 120 000 municipal employees.

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The Gender and Women Empowerment Programme

• The programme falls under the Strategic Affairs
  Directorate
• The Directorate is headed by the Executive
  Director and has the Social Development Unit
  which is headed by and HOU.
• The Social Development Working Group has a staff
  compliment of four people at national office and
  one at each province.
• The political champions of the programme are
  political representatives and officials from all
  provinces and they constitute the Social
  Development Working Group which is chaired by a
  member of the National Executive Committee.

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DEPUTY CEOs

• TOTAL 9
• MEN 8
• WOMEN 1
• Mpumalanga is the only
• province with a woman D/CEO.

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EXECUTIVE MANAGEMENT TEAM EMT

• OLD

• NEW

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NATIONAL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

• OLD

• NEW

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NATIONAL WORKING GROUP CHAIRPERSONS

• OLD

• NEW

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PROVINCIAL CHAIRPERSON

• OLD

• NEW

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Local Government Gender Audit 2004

• Gender Representation of Councillors
• Total Councillors 8 828
• Total Male Councillors
• 6263 70.94
• Total Female Councillors 2565 29.06

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Local Government Gender Audit
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Local Government Gender Audit 2004

• ELECTION TYPE
• TOTAL 8 828
• PR 5 075 WARD 3 753
• PR WARD
• MALE 3165 3 098
• 62.36 82.54
• PR WARD
• FEMALE 1 910 655
• 37.63 17.45

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Local Government Gender Audit 2004

• MAYORS
• MALE TOTAL
• 229 80.63
• FEMALE TOTAL
• 54 19.01
• N/CLASS.
• 01 - 1.6

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Local Government Gender Audit 2004

• DEPUTY MAYORS
• MALE TOTAL
• 74 26.05
• FEMALE TOTAL
• 24 8.45
• N/CLASS.
• 04 1.40
• NONE
• 182 64.08

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Local Government Gender Audit 2004

• SPEAKERS
• MALE TOTAL
• 186 65.49
• FEMALE TOTAL
• 77 - 27.11
• N/CLASS.
• 10 - 3.52
• NONE
• 13 4.58

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Local Government Gender Audit 2004

• CHIEF WHIPS
• MALE TOTAL
• 163 57.39
• FEMALE TOTAL
• 27 9.51
• N/CLASS.
• 9 3.17
• NONE
• 85 29.93

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Local Government Gender Audit 2004

• MUNICIPAL MANAGERS
• MALE TOTAL
• 264 93.31
• FEMALE TOTAL
• 18 6.34
• N/CLASS.
• 1 0.35

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SUCCESS AND CHALLENGES

• Successes
• The Local Government Gender Audit.
• Development of the Local Government Gender Policy
  Framework in partnership with dplg.
• The incorporation of gender empowerment in the
  SALGA constitution.
• The annual Women in Local Government Conferences
  held in partnership with dplg.
• The Benoni Declaration of 2005.

• Challenges
• Partnerships have sometime undermined the common
  cause of women empowerment.
• No common programmes by spheres of government
  that adequately address the roles and
  responsibilities and take into consideration the
  mandate of the different spheres of government.
• The number of women political representatives
  been improved whilst less has been achieved in
  the administration wing of municipalities.

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Local Government Election Plan

• ID documents
• report reported a drastic decline in the voter
  turnout during the local government election as
  compared to the national and provincial
  elections. The youth has been particularly
  mentioned as a group that is apathetic towards
  the electoral process. A small number of the
  young people do participate but the bigger youth
  population has not registered to vote.

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Local Government Election Plan

• Meeting with the political parties (the Womens
  Wing) to discuss the 50/50 Campaign
• The purpose of the meeting is to sensitise women,
  in political parties, to gender issues. In return
  these women will raise awareness in communities.
  The meeting aims at influencing women to lobby
  for nomination (PR and Ward) as candidates and
  the zebra system to be applied on the party lists.

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Local Government Election Plan

• Meeting with NGOs (50/50 Campaign partners) to
  discuss Strategies for illuminating the campaign
  
• A meeting with the 50/50 Campaign partners will
  be held to discuss the campaign strategy. The
  purpose of this meeting is to mobilize resources
  for small municipalities that do not have the
  capacity to implement the campaign.

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Local Government Election Plan

• YOUTH PARTICIPATION
• ID application and distribution
• Youth Voter Education
• Youth Voter Registration
• Post election research to qualitatively determine
  the youth
• participation in the elections

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Local Government Election Plan

• Developing Election Campaign Material
• Developing a catalogue of women in local
  government The project focus will be on women
  councillors (mayors, deputy mayors, speakers and
  chief whips) and senior officials, namely,
  municipal managers and deputy municipal managers.
  

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Local Government Election Plan

• Guidelines to Enhance the Representation and
  Participation of Women in Local Government
• The objectives of the guidelines are to
  articulate in short, ways in which the
  representation and participation of women can be
  enhanced. Representation refers specifically to
  the numbers while participation refers to the
  involvement in relation to positions held.

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Local Government Election Plan 2005/06

• Democracy Development Workshops
• To ensure that all councillors are prepared for
  the LG elections
• To ensure that women who make up 55 of the
  election campaigning population - are well
  informed of the processes that lead to the
  election day i.e. candidate nomination and
  candidate list submission to the IEC, the
  campaigning and voting process, the counting
  process and the legislation related to the
  elections.
• To sensitise political parties (through its
  councillors) on the legal obligation and social
  imperative to equally include women on he party
  lists.

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Local Government Election Plan 2005/06

• Capacity building of Special project Units in
  municipalities.
• Ensuring gender mainstreaming through workshoping
  the municipal and provincial office staff dealing
  with social development programmes

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Local Government Election Plan 2005/06

• The Women in Local Government Conferences
• A national conference will be held in celebration
  of Womens Day in 2005. The national conference
  will be preceded by the provincial conferences.
• Objectives
•   - To give a report back on the progress made
  on the gender and
• HIV/Aids matters that were deliberated on in
  2004
• - To identify the needs of women in order to
  develop a programme
• that will address their needs.
• - To share with the women election plan that
  seeks to enhance their
• representation and participation in LG

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Local Government Election Plan 2005/06

• MEDIA AND PUBLICITY
• Media refers to the media output that SALGA makes
  during 2005. Media includes municipal
  newsletters/publications, radio stations and
  newspapers and television. It is critical that
  SALGA is vocal on supporting the upcoming LG
  lections and also in encouraging engendered
  balloting. The political leaders in local
  government must use the media to promote the LG
  elections.
•  
• Publicity refers to branding around activities in
  the various projects across directorates, units
  and even municipalities. Statements of support
  for the election slogan must be printed on the
  promotional material (e.g. caps, T-shirts, pens
  etc) that will be in conferences or workshops.
  Municipalities must write statements of support
  for the elections n the bills.

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Local Government Election Plan 2005/06

• POST ELECTIONS
• Local Government Audit
•  
• The objectives of this project are to determine
  the gender representation and participation of
  people in them municipal employ. A report will be
  written, printed and circulated to all
  municipalities. An interactive report will be
  posted on the SALGA website. The information will
  be updated quarterly and printed once a year with
  the trend reports.

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Local Government Election Plan 2005/06

• Local Government Audit
• The audit will be on the Special Programmes,
  namely
• Disabilities
• Youth
• Gender
• Race
• The audit will be done on the following
  structure
• Council
• Portfolio Committees
• Ward Committees
• Section 57 Employees
• All levels of employment

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• THANK YOU
• All queries on the presentation must be
  addressed to
• Ayanda Nabe anabe_at_salga.org.za
• Dineo Choabi dchoabi_at_salga.org.za
• Ph 012-369 8000 Fax [phone]