In the aftermath of the recent general elections in Ghana, women in the West African country have continued to express mixed feelings as the nation welcomes its first female Vice President in its 67-year post-independence history.
The development made Ghana one of the 17 African nations to have produced a female Vice President via an election. Notedly, the emergence of 73-year-old Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, a professor of Literature as Ghana’s first female vice president brings the West African nation closer to the possibility of electing its first Female President, as Namibia recently did with the election of its incumbent Vice President, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah.
One of the bones of contention is the seeming inability of female Ghanaian politicians to improve their showing in the country’s parliament, particularly in terms of political party parity. Despite unprecedented legal support secured over the years by Nigerian women, which culminated in the Affirmative Action law of 2022, they have failed to enjoy electoral success as much as Ghanaian women, who only had a similar bill passed by their 8th Parliament in July 2024. Over a 12-year period, Ghana’s parliament has moved up in terms of female representation, from 29 out of 275 female Members in 2012, to 35 by 2016, and 40 by 2020.
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The 2024 elections saw the number of women in parliament stalling at 41 for the first time in at least a decade, with the only difference being in the political party spread. The ruling party, NPP had just nine incoming congresswomen, having lost 31 to the incoming party, NDC. In Nigeria, female representation in parliament has seen a consistent nosedive since the beginning of the fourth republic, from over 8% in 1999 to 4.2% in 2023.
Hon Vida Akekodaga Kabuga, a female Ghanaian politician told Vanguard that female politicians in her country are very tough, adding that those who lost in the parliamentary elections were the ones with issues. She said:”They abandoned their communities after they were given the mandate to lead and lost touch with the grassroots. Some over promised their people what they couldn’t fulfil.
Casualties of poor performance Another important factor is the parties they belong to because the party currently in power performed poorly, so it affected majority of their members including female candidates.” Kabuga revealed that the winner takes all syndrome, corruption and high cost of living which has affected most businesses, alongside the high rate of dollar against the cedis, cost them their seats. “The President was not ready to listen to citizens.
There was a wide gap between citizens and governance. They were selfcentered and his office is surrounded by many incompetent people,” she added. While many Nigerians expressed similar sentiments before the 2023 general elections, the ruling party received the mandate to carry on with the country’s leadership.
A matrilineal society The two countries are similar in many ways, particularly as both are anglophone with very similar educational systems and cultures, but seemingly subtle cultural differences. For instance, Ghana is a matrilineal society, where there are legitimate female monarchs.
According to Kabuga, while Ghanaian men are somewhat discriminatory towards female politicians, they are always willing to vote for women who convince them with the right attitude. “Men will never leave positions for us because we are women. It’s a tough decision for women to join politics everywhere in the world. It needs good strategies, commitment, focus and politeness.
Build trust in voters, understand the needs of the people, limit promises, do regular feedback and lay a good foundation with some developmental activities before coming to contest,” Kabuga noted. President-elect, John Dramani Mahama, of the National Democratic Congress, NDC, in his first coming as President between 2012 and 2017, had made an unprecedented number of female appointments, and there is no reason to believe things will be different this time. Expectations are high given the emergence of a female Vice President and a brand new Affirmative Action law.
Strategy Ghana did not get a female vice president by accident but as part of a strategy whose end game is clear. Hon Vida, a member of the ruling New Patriotic Party, NPP, said she voted for the opposition because of their female vice presidential candidate. She believes the Vice President-elect will perform. “Her party is preparing her to take the presidential seat in the next four years because the president will not contest again. The Ghanaian voting system has changed. This time, they did not vote based on party lines but based on issues. Her party won by a wider margin. They have good policies.
If they implement them well, she will not have a problem of becoming the president soon”. Ghana and Nigeria both have a long way to go. In the Global Gender Gap Index by Afrobarometer, Nigeria places an utterly dismal 129, while Ghana is at an unimpressive 117th out of 156 ,23rd in sub-Saharan Africa. Both fall short of the 40 percent benchmark of the African Union ,AU.
For Nigeria, it will take a seismic shift to move to the enviable positions of countries like Rwanda, Senegal and South Africa. As of December 2023, women constituted 61.3 percent of the Rwandan parliament, making it the country with the highest share of women in parliament worldwide. Even for women in Ghanaian politics, it’s not yet Uhuru.
