KUALA LUMPUR: There is still a long way to go until political leaderships around the world achieve gender parity.
Wanita Umno chief Tan Sri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil said women globally continue to strive and hope to be part of the political scene despite the low representation.
“In the world today, only 23 per cent of national parliamentarians are women, and only 18.3 per cent are government ministers. As of March 2017, only 15 women are serving as heads of state worldwide,” she said at the launch of the Women in Politics Kuala Lumpur 2017 (WIPKL 2017) international conference at the Putra World Trade Centre, here today.
The two-day event, featuring more than 1,000 delegates, is organised by Wanita Umno. It also features female leaders from 18 countries and 27 political parties. The countries include, among others, Australia, the United States, Uganda, Palestine, Mauritius, Kyrgyzstan and South Africa.
Shahrizat, who is WIPKL2017 chairman, expressed hope that the conference will trigger fruitful discussion that will address the importance of substantive equality among the delegates.
She said some countries such as Argentina and Mauritius are already making a leap to enable equal access to women in political leadership.
“I hope other countries, especially Malaysia, would follow soon,” she said.
Shahrizat also touched on the conference’s theme, ‘Women and Industrial Revolution 4.0: Leadership and Substantive Equality’, and said the lines between the physical, biological and digital world are becoming increasingly blurred.
“This environment where the development of innovations largely revolves around technology, must see both women leaders and politicians keeping up with the Industry 4.0 knowledge,” she said. Women, she added, must subsequently make maximum use of technologies to help their parties win elections.
She said as the digital world constantly evolves, women actively involved in politics must know issues such as Industry 4.0, especially when this industry presents both opportunities and challenges as it can either empower women or widen inequality.