By Dr Ngarikutuke Tjiriange
IT is true and a reality recognized by our Constitution (Article 23(3) of the Constitution) that women in Namibia have traditionally suffered special discrimination and there is a need to encourage and enable them to play a full, equal and effective role in the political, social, economic and cultural life of the nation.
The women in this country should not feel they are, and be treated as, second-class citizens or human beings. The political decision to introduce equal representation (50/50) of men and women in the structures and organs of political parties is a laudable idea and deserves to be supported.
However, that must be done in such a way and manner that the country should not be seen to be violating its own laws by infringing upon the rights of citizens to elect the leaders of their choice, being either women or men.
The amendments to the SWAPO Party constitution clearly provide for equal representation of men and women in the party structures, although it appears the women will be more than men by 20 delegates at the congress.
There is no problem with these provisions of the SWAPO constitution. However, it is important to apply our minds on the basic issues and repercussions of such decisions.
This issue has its positive and negative sides and can be a complicated one particularly in a society like ours. People should debate this issue maturely and openly. Unfortunately, I have realized that there is a tendency in our society for some people to be not so frank with what they are thinking and sometimes resort to hiding their true feelings to appear to be supportive of some decisions, though in reality they do not support such decisions.
The positive side of this decision is that the country is trying to empower our women and enable them to be equal to their male counterparts in whatever they do. This equality is there in the Constitution and the laws of the country but there is a need to put those provisions into practice.
That is indeed is commendable. However, there are some practical problems that the country may be confronted with in the process of implementing this rather laudable decision. For the country to implement such a decision we need ideologically clear, politically and educationally capable people in vital positions.
In order for me to make my point let me analyze the political situation in which the political parties and the government are operating.
Most of the political parties, if not all of them, in this country are conglomerations of various and different forces and classes. Their support bases are from all classes in our society. You find under one political roof workers, peasants, feudals, bourgeoisie, capitalists, socialists, Christians, atheists, etc. Under these circumstances there is no ideological compass that clearly directs political parties, or ideological glue that keeps the various forces together.
In this ideological vacuum there is no predictable and clear revolutionary theory which binds together and directs the parties, and which is followed by their leaders, hence the absence of revolutionary directions and positions.
We should realize that during the time of the liberation struggle we were all united by the desire to liberate our country and gain our political independence, irrespective of our standing and place in the society.
That was, indeed, our political glue which kept and bound us together. But now having achieved our political independence we have to know in which revolutionary direction are we going. The ideological vacuum, which I referred to above, unfortunately leads to some people concerning themselves with issues that are not necessarily conducive and helpful to the progressive development of their parties and the country as a whole. All the things being equal, we should have our priorities correct if we want to bring about meaningful, everlasting and tangible changes and development of the country for the benefit of all generations.
We seem not to be worried about what ideological beliefs and ideas a person should have towards the revolutionary transformation of our society but are more concerned with the gender of individual members of the parties and the social positions of tribal groups such as the San people, etc.
The capability and ideological coherence of members are not of paramount concern to us, but other issues that are in fact of emotional and political nature sometimes seem to preoccupy our minds.
To me it is of utmost importance to have a platform in the party in place where all the party cadres, irrespective of their gender, will be moulded into politically capable and functionally up-to-date persons in order for them to be able to propel and push the party forward into a progressive direction and successful future. The idea of the party school was conceived for achieving this purpose some years back, but nothing tangible came of it. Now this idea has been left out and the idea of gender equality has taken precedence over ideological preparations of party cadres.
As much as the issue of gender equality is, indeed, very important it does not necessarily has as its clear requirement the ideological and political knowledge and capability of the people concerned.
It is most likely to be a mathematical formula whereby the numbers of different sexes must be equal in party structures. As much as issues of equality of gender are important, and they are indeed important, the question is what ideological and political set of ideas and predictable socio-economic system is going to come out of these and be put in place in developing our country, and that will enhance and influence the economic prosperity of our nation.
We cannot and should not just be directed and driven by the emotions that the people belong to this or the other tribal group or groups or the other gender, etc. but the national and class interest must be a determining factor in what socio-economic achievements we want to promote, which will transform our country into a society where its resources are at the disposal of the majority of our people.
The people who are going to bring about the positive economic and political changes must be judged by the knowledge they possess, which will be useful in putting in place programmes that are to benefit the majority of the people of the land, irrespective of their gender and tribal origin.
It is against this background that it is dangerous and unacceptable to wheelbarrow people, who do not have a clear ideological and developmental vision of what they want to achieve for the society they are required to serve, into political and power positions just because they belong to this or the other gender.
I am convinced that the development of any given society will only be achieved if those in position of power and responsibility, irrespective of their gender, have great, practical and appropriate ideas but are not driven by emotions and triviality of the mind.
The capability and ability to deliver must not be compromised by other political and emotional considerations. It is imperative that the people we put in positions will be given such responsibilities if they are only capable of doing what is expected of them not because they are either men or women.
I conclude by saying – it is possible that if we take capable people out of positions just because they have to create space for other persons based only on gender considerations, those capable people will sit on the fence and watch the performance of the party deteriorating without them coming to the rescue of the party.
If we do so the chances of putting the parties and government in reverse gear will be great.