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In Search of Gender Justice: Can NEPAD Deliver?
by Zenebeworke Tadesse
Visiting Lecturer, African Gender Institute
Public seminar Centre for Studies, University of Cape Town, May 28, 2002
Work In Progress - Do Not Quote without the Author's Permission.
Background
At present, there are two Africa-wide initiatives that have invigorated what for a lack of a better alternative, I will call long dormant Pan African debates.' On the one hand, there is the effort to create an African Union by the Constitutive Act of Union that has been agreed upon by the heads of states and governments and is to be fully formalized in Pretoria in July 2002. This process has been preceded by the preparation of Protocol establishing the Pan-African Parliament, a legislative body that is to be the law-making wing of the Union in years to come.
On the other hand, The New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD), Africa's strategy for achieving sustainable development in the 21st Century, was adopted by African leaders at the July 2001 Lusaka Summit. The New African Initiative (NAI) was a merger of the Millennium Partnership for the African Recovery Program (MAP) and the Omega Plan. The Omega Plan was first presented by Senegal during the January 2001 France-Africa Summit and launched by Senegal in June 2001 at the International Conference of Economists on the Omega Plan. MAP was spearheaded by South Africa with support from Nigeria and Algeria, with the involvement of Senegal and Egypt, and received endorsement from the Extraordinary OAU Summit in March 2001 in Sitre, Libya, which declared the establishment of the African Union.
At the inaugural meeting of the Implementation Committee of Heads of State and Government (IC/HOSG) on the NEPAD, the Committee decided that "all other initiatives promoted by individual African countries should be subsumed under the NEPAD process, to represent a basis on which Africa can collectively and effectively cooperate with its development partners.' NEPAD is said to be an African initiated and driven framework for interaction with the rest of the world with the long-term vision of eradicating poverty and bringing about sustainable development.
Promoted as Africa's Marshall plan, it is premised on the 'determination of Africans to extricate themselves and the Continent from the malaise of underdevelopment and exclusion in a globalizing world', it is also 'a call for a new relationship of partnership between Africa and the international community, particularly the highly industrialized countries, to overcome the development chasm that has widened over centuries of unequal relations.' The promoters of NEPAD have identified a number of favorable conditions that are likely to ensure the potential success of NEPAD. These include the ownership and management of NEPAD by African leaders, the changed global environment since the end of the Cold War, and the growing number of democracies in Africa.
Since its inception as MAP and the Plan Omega to its current form as NEPAD, this 'new' initiative has solicited extensive consultations with G7, the leaders of international financial institutions (IFIs), as well as other Western countries. However, with few exceptions, to date such forms of consultations have not taken place in most African parliaments, among African political parties, and members of civil society. Yet, the NEPAD document is being promoted as an agenda set by African peoples through their own volition, to shape their own destiny.
The guiding principles of the initiative include "people-centered development', the "expansion of democratic frontiers and the deepening of the culture of human rights…" and the "consolidation of democracy…." In a telling remark, President Thabo Mbeki, in response to enquiries from the South African Parliament, identified "peer review" as the primary mechanism to ensure democratic principles are respected by all members of the African Union, and the African Commission and Human and Peoples Rights as the primary watchdog of human rights, rather than the African civil society. It is important to note that the overall history of African Commission and Human and Peoples Rights has not been one of a watchdog institution.
South Africa, which spearheaded the campaign for NEPAD, will host the inaugural meeting of the African Union in July 2002. There is a major likelihood that the meeting will endorse the decision to have NEPAD supersede all other initiatives. In view of this possibility, in the recent past, there have been a number of continent-wide conferences, consultations and campaigns on NEPAD. In the meantime, the implementation of NEPAD has already begun, with its secretariat already determined. While most observations emanating from Africa have been critical of both the top-down approach to the preparation and promotion of NEPAD, the initial response of most donor countries has been positive. This discrepancy between the internal and external response to NEPAD has become one area of great interest and analysis among those following the trajectory of this new 'partnership' especially under changed conditions following September 11.
The major components of NEPAD consist of four 'initiatives', all of which are defined as prerequisites for the success of the programmed. These include the Peace and Security Initiative, the Democracy and Political Governance Initiative; the Economic Governance Initiative; and the Sub-Regional and Regional Approaches to Development. Although the paper is focused on the gender implications of the Democracy and Political Governance Initiative, by way of introduction, I will provide the highlight of the Economic Governance Initiative as discussing the two initiatives separately blurs the many challenges facing advocates of gender justice.
The Major stated goal of NEPAD is the reduction of poverty through a path
of sustainable growth and development. The specific goals on the other hand,
are based on the Millennium Development Goals of the United Nations that were
endorsed by the General Assembly in 2000. In order to achieve the goal of poverty
reeducation, NEPAD hopes to increase domestic savings and improvements in public
revenue collection systems. However, the plan is premised on mobilizing the
bulk of the resources from outside the continent. Hence NEPAD estimates a resource
gap of 12.5 percent or UAD 64 billion annually that it hopes to mobilize through
increased trade and aid. What then is new or African about NEPAD?
Throughout the 1980s, there were no less than five Africa initiated development
strategies, the most well known of which was the Lagos Plan of Action for the
Economic Development of Africa, 1980-2000. Based on a review of the development
paradigms and strategies that Africa has pursued since independence in 1960,
the Lagos Plan of Action prioritized regional integration and put emphasis on
the need for self-reliance, socio-economic transformation, human development
and the democratization of the development process. However the timing of these
imitative that took four years to complete coincided with the emergence of the
neo-liberal agenda and the imposition of Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAP).
Furthermore the 'home grown 'development strategy also lacked the requisite
commitment for its implementation by African heads of state.
Given this and subsequent precedents, one of the architects of the aforementioned development strategies recently asked, " Why has the NEPAD imitative, unlike the five African initiatives of the 1980s and 1990s, been so well received by the donor community and the Breton Woods institutions since its publication in 2001?" He goes on to ask, has there been a dramatic change of heart and attitude on the part of these institutions? Are they going through a paradigm shift? (Adedeji, A, 2000: 3).
However, a closer reading of the NEPAD document would seem to indicate that the major shift is to be found among the African leaders keen on promoting NEPAD as the "African Development Strategy". The new in NEPAD is the self-prescribed 'conditionalities' that portray an uncanny resemblance to the political conditionalities and governance reform which donors devised in the post Cold War era (Olokushi, A. 2002:4).
In other words, the four indicatives such as the Democracy and Political Governance Initiative are considered as prerequisites both for the successful implementation of the goals or the programs and for the long-term sustainability of the development process in Africa. In turn adherence to these prerequisites of say 'good governance' is expected to be received with material support from the developed countries and international financial institutions. It is this reciprocal logic whereby self-subscription/self-adherence to 'best' international practices is traded for international financial support that is integral to the entire concept of partnership that underpins the NEPAD" (ibid,). Herein lies the answer to Adedeji's query regarding the support of the G8 for NEPAD. In addition to endorsing the ne0-liberal paradigm, the proposed African Review Mechanism endorses the new move by donors to greater selectivity in allocating development assistance among recipients.
Selective disbursement of development assistance or the call for African solution to Africa's problems are not new trends and date back to the intensification of Africa' marginalization during the late 1980s. The foreign policy of the Clinton era was premised on the notion of 'Africa's new leaders', a concept referring to 'new approaches to governing'. As one author of a book on the then new leaders, Presidents of Uganda, Eritrea and the Prime Minster of Ethiopia noted 'optimistic observers saw these leaders 'as the best representatives of Africa's new leaders and the epitome of new generation of statesmen who have rejected the failed policies of their predecessors and ready to take on the challenges of the global economy and the post Cold War World/" (Ottaway, M. 1999.
The recent cancellation of debt owed to Britain by Mozambique is perhaps the most recent case of the provision of development assistance as a reward for good governance. A UN news release of May 16, 2002 noted " Mozambique secured its image as the poster child of donor counties on Thursday as Britain announced that it has written off all of the country's bilateral debt." The article goes on to quote a senior Mozambican Foreign Affairs official who saw the cancellation as reward to good governance. He is quoted as saying " we have shown that we are committed to reducing poverty by implementing strong-IMF supported economic policies/ our reward is well-deserved." (UN, 2002).
However, such selective rewards will not amount to the anticipated resource flows in NEPAD. The crafters of NEPAD have tended to ignore the declining trend in resource flows in the post-Cold War era. In addition to selective engagement, the new development cooperation framework entails using development assistance to address cross=border problems which are of direct concern to donor countries. These include the spread of infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDs and resurgent drug resistant diseases, degradation of the national environment and organized international crime and since September 11, an undefined 'terrorism'. Given this grim reality, NEPAD's Capital Flows imitative is at best naïve in its attempt to show case Africa as relatively 'risk free' content for Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). There is an avalanche of data indicating that FDI is concentrated in developed countries especially the US and is highly selected number of middle-income countries. Focused as it is on attracting capital by any means, NEPAD has paid little attention to the links between most of measures it is promoting under the Capital Flows Initiative and the likely increase in poverty and further marginalization of Africa.
A case in point is NEPAD's assessment of SAPs. In a passing reference, it is noted that SAPs were 'inadequate' because 'they neglected social services.' Since the 1980s, much has been written on the impact of SAPS including its impact on women and gender relations (Elson, 1989; Sparr, 1994). Recent monitoring of SAPs indicates that far from neglecting the social services have gone beyond cost recovery to a demand requiring the implementation of full cost recovery in public utilities. Full cost recovery entails removing public subsidies for water and insisting consumer fees or tariffs that can increase until the full costs of operation and maintenance of the water utility is recovered. This is a prelude to privatization so that the financial standing of the company can be improved prior to its sale. The implication of liberalization essential services raises new questions on citizenship rights generally and the much touted goal of poverty reduction.
These new developments as well as a synthesis of the many findings of studies on SAPs provide us with highly valuable insights on the magnitude and meaning of socio-political changes underway since the 1980s. Far from being short-term measures of 'economic recovery', SAPs 'exacerbated the crises of decline but also represented the final nail in the coffin of the post-colonial mode of accumulation and the social contract that was built into it' (Olokushi, A, A. 2002: 7). In light of this reality a new and democratic agenda is one that envisions a new social bargain that is both democratic and conducive to the task of development.
At a time when the hegemony of the Washington Consensus' is substantially eroded as a result of unrelenting critic from a multitude of social forces as well as the realities on the ground. And despite its claims to being Africa-led and owned initiative, the new partnership for Africa (NEPAD) is an unmitigated endorsement of the neoliberal agenda. The leaders promoting NEPAD have identified governance as a 'superpriority' but fail to address the gendered nature of governance both from its analysis of the past and its future plans. This short note is therefore a critic of NEPAD that draws on lessons of the past for ordinary Africans especially women with a focus on accountability and zeroes in on one of the superpriorities that is democratic governance.
The paper draws on critics of the good governance discourse by way of exploring the similarities and differences offered by NEPAD. More importantly, the essay will provide a synthesis of the debates on gender and governance that NEPAD has completely ignored. To be sure NEPAD makes sporadic mention of women in the document but the most detailed and telling view of the place assigned to women and gender relations is to be found in Paragraph 49 where it is stated that Africa leaders will take joint responsibility for: As the NEPAD goals are restatement of the millennial goals, the retreat even from the recently endorsed Beijing Platform of Action should not come as a surprise.
"Promoting the role of women in social and economic development by reinforcing their capacity in the domains of education and training; by the development of revenue-generating activities through facilitating access to credit; and by assuring their participation in the political and economic life of African Countries."
In addition under long Term Objectives, Paragrapah 68 states;
"To make progress towards gender equality and empowering women by eliminating gender disparities in the enrolment in primary and secondary education by 2005"To reduce maternal mortality ratio by three-quarters between 1990 and 2015"
"To provide access for all who need reproductive health services by 2015."
Revisiting Good Governance
To the extent that NEPAD is located within the neo-liberal framework, earlier critics of 'good governance are applicable to it. In the 1980s, structural adjustment became the hegemonic development paradigm with its slogan 'getting prices right' through curbing the power of 'the interventionist state'. When structural adjustment failed to bring about the anticipated growth rate after a decade of harsh measures, the focus shifted to getting institutions right via the promotion of the good governance agenda. In other words, the failure to bring about economic growth was now explained away by 'poor governance' as the major causal factor. According to the World Bank, 'the root cause of weak economic performance in the past was 'the failure of public institutions' (World Bank, 1989:XII).
The economic policies of structural adjustment failed due to the 'crisis of governance' as evidenced by lack of accountability, transparency and predictability. The Bank further argued that "it was Africa's uncertain and unpredictable political environment that was discouraging private investors from risking their money, due to fear that their property would be unprotected and their profits consumed by corruption. Despite a belated recognition of the state in the development process, the 'ideal 'good governance state' remained the minimal state defined in a narrow, technocratic functionalist terms whose goal was limited to furthering the goals of adjustment model (Mkandawire, T & Suludo, C, 1999; Abrahmson, 2000). More concretely, according to the Bretton Woods institutions and now NEPAD, a good government is one that does not intervene in production, but limits itself to providing physical and social infrastructure, including legal framework favorable to private property (DAWN, 1995).
As for NEPAD, far from being a new departure from established practices, every single factor included under the rubric of democracy and governance initiative is a replica of the key principles identified by the Bank Staff. In fact NEPAD has omitted democratic principles that were thrown in by the Bank such as free flow of information and encouragement of a culture of public debate. On the other hand, NEPAD has retained the managerial and procedural aspects with a focus on institutional and bureaucratic efficiency and accountability.
Transforming Institutions
What in fact would have made NEPAD a new strategy is if it had taken up the challenge of elaborating on the fundamental requirements of transparency and accountability and on the type of institutions that could actually support the capacity of 'good governance'. As one observation noted, "if corruption, inefficiency and waste are really to be rooted out of the system, then it is essential to create institutions that will op\en the state actions to public scrutiny. For this there has been very little enthusiasm on the part of the Bank or of governments. In its absence, the pressure for 'good governance' has led to no governance at all. State' capacity for any form of governance has been severely curtailed along with state's resources for development projects " (DAWN, 1995: 39-40).
It is also important to note that another similarity between the neoliberal version of 'good governance' and NEPAD is the claim to' speak on behalf of ordinary people and to emphasize that the primary aim of governance is 'to empower' them. In both the World Bank's good governance agenda and in NEPAD, the key effect is 'the constructing of structural adjustment and the institutions and countries (partners) that promote it as a force for democracy. The use of good governance blurs' the distinction between democratization and the retreat of the state from the social and economic field, and thereby constructs a new legitimacy for economic liberalism in the form of structural adjustment programmes'. Likewise, the agenda's claim (both the Banks and now NEPAD's) to 'empower ordinary people 'deprives the term of its radical political connotations and gives it a highly instrumentalist meaning.
In the good governance parlance 'empowerment ' merely implies the validation of cost recovery whose overall aim is to realize the energies of ordinary people' and to 'empower ordinary people to take advantage of their own lives, to make communities more responsible for their development and to make governments listen to the people' (World Bank, 1989: 54). In brief, the incorporation of words like 'empowerment', 'self-help and participation' into the Bank's otherwise monetarist vocabulary serves primarily to justify the curtailment of state responsibility (Abrahamsen, 2000: 58). After a decade of deleterious outcomes especially for women who are in charge of the 'care economy', NEPAD has unashamedly embraced this instrumentalist notion of empowerment.
Towards a Democratic Developmental State
Those genuinely engaged with searching sustainable solutions have recommended abandoning the 'technocratic twist' of the good governance agenda and initiate a process aimed at bringing about a democratic developmental state that is 'relatively efficient, capable and willing'. According to this authors, 'the constitution of democratic developmental state may be the single most important task on the policy agenda in Africa. This being the case, 'the challenge should not be reduced to merely enhancing the technobureacratic capacity of the state' but one that seeks 'to embed such a development state within democratic social institutions and governance structures.' Not only such a challenge require imagination but also a sense of history (Mkandawire& Soludo, 1999: 133).
Such a vision resonates with advocates of gender justice who have been clamoring for a transformed democratic and developmental state. They have learnt through their long struggle that it is only such a state that has the potential of becoming accountable to the needs and concerns of ordinary men and women instead of 'external partners and the rich and powerful in our countries. Another lesion that women have drawn from the engagement with democratic movements and with states throughout the last century is that gender accountability does not result automatically. In order to be beneficiaries of a more transparent, open, participatory and accountable state, advocates of gender justice have to create and strengthen autonomous women's organization, be able to build and sustain coalitions with other sectors of civil society and acquire a variety of technical skills for strategic and pro-active analysis and planning.
Since its release, NEPAD has been subjected to a growing number of critics by activists of gender justice. To date, the critics can be classified into three categories. All critics agree that NEPAD is a gender blind document. Secondly all three highlight the lack of participation by African civil society as well as the legislature in most countries. Both groups advocate for the promotion of women's empowerment by NEPAD in tune with the African and Beijing Platform of Action. These critics recommended the need for inclusion of women's human rights and the acknowledgment of international human rights instruments that African leaders have already signed. What this point underscores is the well-entrenched practice by most African governments to espouse gender equity, without series risk of being held accountable-of having to operationalize the promises make in top-level rhetoric (Goetz, 1995). In the case of NEPAD, even the rhetoric regarding women's human rights is missing.
But one group adopts the position of 'entry' into the NEPAD process and calls for a crude form mainstreaming gender into NEPAD thereby providing legitimacy. The major lacuna is perceived as the absence of gender experts and expertise from the NEPAD process (AWF, 2002)
From these concerns we can surmise easily surmise that the new development strategy
that has failed to seek partnership with major stakeholders in Africa can not
be perceived as new or responsive to the majority of its constituents in Africa.
This form of exclusionary and insular policy making ought to be a sobering reality
for gender advocates who in the recent past have invested a disproportionate
amount of their energy advocating for an increase in women's representation
in decision-making bodies, a point to which we will return below. Suffice it
to say here that while women's increased political participation is a legitimate
concern, equal weight ought to be given on reforming democratic institutions
so as to enhance women's diverse interests through legislative and policy initiatives.
One author recommended the need for stocktaking of existing mechanisms put in place since the Beijing conference at the national and regional levels that could 'play an important albeit late process of engagement' in NEPAD. If it found that various initiatives such as the women's ministries and Commissions at the national level, the women's unit at the Organization of African Unity (OAU) and the Economic Commission of the Untied Nations (ECA) have not been really effective, other options will have to be considered. The major message of the submission is the need to learn from existing initiatives, shift away from a top down approach and ensure a systematic consultations of women at all levels (Ige, O. 2000:39).
Toward a Conducive and Responsive Environment
For her part (Butegwa, 2002: 78) called for explicit commitments including resource commitments and using NEPAD as a tool for mainstreaming gender in all sectors and strategies and for narrowing gender gaps in each sector. More importantly the author called for the creation of an environment conducive to optimum participation of women in the NEPAD project. Not only constitutional provisions and international human rights instruments that are ratified by African governments not implemented but most African governments have failed to use national budgets as tools for narrowing the gender gap and as instruments for promoting equality. On the contrary argues Butegwa the existing trend indicates national budget allocations exacerbate the gender gap. One of her major recommendation calls for the participation of gender experts and women generally in the formulation of policy at the macro, meso and micro level. Such a measure, she argues, would bring to policymaking women's own expertise, experiences and concerns, and most likely ensure a gender responsive policy framework.
Implementing Commitments and Ensuring Participation
The second gender-focused review of NEPAD undertaken by MATCH International entailed a comprehensive point-by-point review of the entire NEPAD document. One of the first observations made by the document is that the people-centered element found in the Omega plan is lost. Echoing points made by the previous review, the recommendation calls for the promotion of the empowerment of women by NEPAD in tune with the proposal outlined in both the African Platform for Action adopted in Dakar, Senegal and the Beijing Platform for Action of 1995.
In addition to calling attention to the debt crisis, the need for gender disaggregation of issues such as poverty, the document calls attention to the lack of synergy between the growing democracy in Africa and the process of preparing NEPAD with a large percentage of the African continent scarcely knowing about the whole process. As for leadership, the document calls for 'visionary, open to public participation, honest and courageous enough to embrace female perspective that was either missing, marginalized or ignored' (Match International, 2002).
Lessons From the Past
My own assessment of NEPAD is that it is not capable and lacks the will to
engage with issues of gender justice other democratic issues. While I share
the sentiment expressed by those who call for a democratic and developmental
state, ensuring a firm and sustainable basis for gender justice can not be taken
for granted. Drawing lessons of why women and other disadvantaged groups who
pay the price in bringing about change ends up losing during most periods of
transition and consolidation. Gong beyond national border, advocates of gender
justice have to begin to envision an inclusive and gender just Africa. . A Quick
glance at the historiography of the colonial and the post colonial period in
terms of women's political participation or lack thereof would provide useful
insights into what now appears to be a well entrenched pattern of women's heightened
self mobilization followed by period during which women are underrepresented
in subsequently formed governance structures. Although mainstream
African historiography is silent about women's participation in anti-colonial
restistance and protest movements, we can now draw on the sources accumulated
by gender aware historians of the period. For purposes of the major point being
made by this note, we will divide these movements into two, namely women's resistance
movements in a selected number of countries prior to the emergence of armed
national liberation movements followed by a brief foray into women in liberation
movements.
Since the emergence of gender aware historiography mostly in the 1980s, we have been able to have a glimpse of women's role in the anti-colonial resistance movements. Based on these sources, one can in fact argue that in a large number of cases it was women's self mobilized resistance that was the catalyst of the anti-colonial movements as well as the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa. Support for this assertion can be found in studies of women's resistance to colonial rule in Nigeria, Kenya, Cameroon and of course South Africa. In Nigeria, women resisted colonial domination by protesting against specific economic and political policies of the colonial government.
The Women's War in Nigeria
The best documented of these resistances include the Aba Women's Riots of 1929 and the Egba Women's protest of 1947. Invariably known as the Women's War and the Women's Revolt, women protested the colonial administration's most egregious taxation policies and policies prohibiting assembly (Mba, 1992; Akpan and Ekpo, 1988; Dike, 1995). While the records show the level of destabilization posed by these women initiated and led revolts, chronicle's of African leadership omit the names of Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti the women who organized the Egba women's protest and that of Margaret Ekpo the women who played a pivotal role in the creation of the Nigerian nation-state.
Kenyan Women Destabilizing Colonial Authority
Women's resistance in Kenya and Cameroon seem to have been triggered by the same cause and interestingly using almost identical methods of resistance. In the case of Kenya women engaged in open rebellion in the 1930 and 1950s following attempts by the colonial administration to force women to undertake soil conservation measures such as terracing, planting trees and engaging in mixed farming. These measures increased women's workloads and limited the time for their other myriad activities.
In 1948, women in Muranga district resisted soil conservation measures. An estimated '2500 women from Muranga danced and sang and informed they would not take part in soil conservation mainly because they felt they had enough to do at home.' When the district Commissioner ordered their arrest, 'they were quickly released by a large crowd of their own sex brandishing sticks and shouting Amazon war cries'. The colonial commissioner opined that " if left unchecked, (they) might have precipitated a landslide in government authority" (Oduol and Kabira, 2000: 107). In the early 1950s, women joined the Mau Mau where they made up about 5 percent of the guerrilla fighters but a much larger size of women supported the struggle trough the preparation and carrying of food, hiding firearms and conveying messages.
As a result of their active participation a handful of women rose to leadership position within the Mau Mau. Cases in point include Marshall Mughoni who became a Field Marshall and Wanjiru Nyamarata who became a judge in the Mau Mau courts in Nakuru town, administered oaths and recruited guerrilla fighters. Despite the active participation of women in the various forms of anti-colonial struggle, the most influential African political group of the time, the Agikuyu Central Association maintained leadership as a male preserve, a measure that led to the marginalization of women their subsequent withdrawal to form their own organization ((Oduol and Kabira, 2000: 108).
The response of the colonial government was to women's growing militancy was
the establishment of a national women's organization known as Maendeleo Ya Wanawake.
The major activity of this new organization was limited to teaching women traditional
'female skills'. However, the noteworthy feature is the form of cooptation utilized
by the colonial government that was to set a precedent for postcolonial government
in most parts of Africa. In this case, the colonial government sought the support
of some Kenyan women in return for which they were exempted from forced labor.
The ANLU Rebellion in Cameroon
In Cameroon, women in North West Cameroon launched a three-year period of revolt in 1958- 61 known as the ANLU Rebellion was provoked by the colonial imposition of vertical contour farming. Through public singing, verbal insults, dancing and demonstrating in public and seizing control of resources, women signaled the intensification of their anti-colonial protest and seized political power from Kom men (Ardener, 1975). Subsequently, women in Cameroon played an active role in the struggle for independence as well as the Unification of Cameroon. What is most striking these series of protest, is the lack of continuity and erasure from societal memory, cooptation of the leaders into emergent state structures and the transformation of the methods of resistance such as singing and dancing into activities legitimizing authoritarian rule for most of the independence period.
Long Journey to Gender Justice in South Africa
In the case of South African women, their organized resistance dates back to 1908 where women of East London protested against high rents and threats of arrest. By 1912 and 1913, women's protest had become broader-based culminating in a sophisticated campaign against the pass laws. The women's anti-pass campaign used the tactics of the newly used by the newly formed South African Natives National Congress (SANNC) including petitions to the Ministry of Native Affairs, but went further and engaged in mass action including refusal to carry passes and attempts to block arrest of its members. Subsequently black women formed their own autonomous organization known as the Native and Coloured Women's Association whose major activity revolved around fund raising and building support for jailed women activists (kemp et al, 1995: 132). In her comprehensive documentation of women's anti-pass struggles, Julia Wells (1993) posits that the resistance of women 'far exceeded the actions of their male counterparts in militancy. However, their militancy was inspired by a more conservative concern for their roles as mothers and homemakers and neither these protests or the formation of women's organization was able to confront' the underlying systemic, aspects of women's subordination' (Meintjes, 1998; 69).
Although the earlier antipass campaign was suspended at the break of the First World War, a national antipass campaign was reactivated in the 1950s by which time there were a large number of women's organizations as well as other organizations such as the African National Congress. During the conference of these emergent organizations in 1954, a Women's Charter was drafted establishing the principle of full equality wit men. It was through the joint effort of organizations such as the African National Congress Women's League (ANCLW) The Federation of South African Women (FSAW) and other organizations that women were able to organize a march of 20, 000 women in Pretoria in 1956. When the Freedom Charter was drawn up in 1955, organizations such as FSAW 'ensured that the issues of concern to women were reflected in the Charter. Since the 1950s to the formation of a post apartheid state, women in South Africa have formed numerous organizations with varying degree of success. The point of these brief foray into the history of the South African women's movement was to indicate the crucial importance of an autonomous women's organization(s) that could articulate women's diverse and changing demands and be able to form coalitions with other organizations and political parties.
African Women and Liberation Movements
The third type of engagment of women in the political arena has been through their active particpation in armed struggles that took place from Algeria to Zimbabwe. The pattern set during the Algerian liberation movement seemed to have persisted with minor variations throughout the rest of Africa. During the Algerian War, women played an active role in the network of distance, provided assitance to the men in combat and helped with intelligence, communication, provision of food and care of guerilla fighters families. Women militants acted as liason agents, collected medicince and transported weapons. However, in risking their lives in the anti- colonial war, women were fighting for nationalism and national liberation not for their cause as women (Charrad, M 2001: 185). In her interview with ex women combatants Charrad was informed about the absence of a women's project in the nationalist struggle despite the involvement of the women in the war.
It was only on the eve of the independence that FLN expressed some intention to associate women with public life and the development of the country. Although leaders of the nationalist movement were aware of the tensions surrounding family law and codes of personal status, they avoided taking a clear stand for the duration of the nationalist struggle. In the context of a growing rhetoric of equality during the immediate post independent period, hopes about family law and expansion of women's rights were raised. In the 1960s and 70s, women failed to form organizations that could have defend women's rights. Although there was the National Union of Algerian Women, it was entirely under the control of the FLN, Consequently:
"As Algerians, men and women took nation building and the development of the new country as the top priority at independence, issues of family law and women's rights were subordinated to other political agendas. The promises made by political leaders in the euphoria of independence were unfulfilled. Instead family law quickly became caught in disagreement among conflicting tendencies and in struggles among forces competing for power in a new national state…In adopting, the Family Code of 1984, the Algerian state catered to social and political forces with vested interests in the preservation of the extended partilineal kinship structure sanctioned by Islamic family law. In doing so, it sacrificed women's interests and the transformation of family law to political considerations" (Charrad: 220:189).
This then is the overall pattern in most liberation movements. Active participation in nationalist movements with very little gains in the post independence period or a dramatic reversal of the gains made as illustrated by recent return to customary law in Zimbabwe. Women in South Africa seem to have drawn lessons from the successes and failures elsewhere when they fought hard for an inclusive consultation process, a democratic constitution and a system of governance and on going debates on taking gender issues in post-apartheid South Africa.
But it is still important to recall that despite amassing a type of women's political leverage at a strategic stage in the political transition, not yet seen in the Continent, South African women were still excluded from the negotiation proves. While they seem to have registered impressive gains in reproductive rights and rights of freedom from violence, they were less successful concerning socio-economic rights beyond those related to basic needs. One observer noted, despite great strides made, South Africa's constitutional stipulations tended to overlook deeply entrenched socio-economic structures and deep-rooted beliefs about gender relations. Moreover, in practice, it proved easier for the new government to 'talk the talk than walk the walk' when it came to funding the advancement of gender equality' (Beall, J. 2001: 142)
Women in Democratic Transitions in Africa
One of the distinguishing characteristics of the current phase of democratization in Africa that has emerged since the late 1980s is women's increased visibility and voice as interdependent political actors. An illustrative example is that of women in Zimbabwe following the recent elections. In a series of press releases that was distributed world wide, women in Zimbabwe rejected the outcome of the election that has disfranchise them through the many efforts to rig the election. Those in charge of election were not concerned about women's multiple responsibilities and hence shortage of time, a precious citizenship resource. Moreover, the election related violence endangered their lives and their health through the risk of HIV/AIDs. Replicating the long and entrenched pattern of sidelining women, debates on democratization have failed to address the gendered nature of democratization. In most cases, women are only mobilized for voting and or providing services in political parties.
Throughout the 1990s, women played very active and most visible role in protests against authoritarian rule in Mali, Kenya, Sierra Leone, and Guinea and in Niger. In Kenya women were in the forefront of protests in support of imprisoned human rights activists and in protests against human rights abuses. In Mali, it was the demonstration of women and youth that led to the eventual downfall of Moussa Troare. In the case of Niger, several thousand women demonstrated against the exclusion of women representatives from a preparatory commission charged with organizing the country's National Conference in 1991 (Tripp, 2001). These iniatives appear to have remained episodic and have not yet resulted in institutionalized engagment with long transformation of the emergent and still partriarchal states.
Despite women's increased and active participation and perhaps because of it, most political parties are unwilling to adopt measures that would increase women's representation and to adequately address women's concerns. In the recent past, the most noteworthy achievement in terms of women's political participation and democratization in Africa has been the phenomenal increase in women's 'autonomous' organization. Marking a significant departure from the 1950- 1999 era during which women were most mobilized through a party wing, a mass organization of women under the auspices of the ruling party that in most countries suppressed women's rights, women all over Africa have been forming a plethora of associations, with bold and new programmes as well as new coalitions.
In terms of political participation, the effort of women's nonpartisan organizations have tended to focus on increasing the number of women in position of leadership, advocating reform of constitutions and other discriminatory laws and practices. In some countries like Kenya, Uganda, Zimbabwe for example, women are leading figures in the anticorruption and antisectarian struggles. Yet good governance agendas, such as NEPAD limit judicial reforms to the creation of an enabling environment for the private sector and especially removing barriers in the path of free trade and capital flows. Women's organizations have to accelerate their advocacy for the construction and strengthening of countervailing institutions to executive power, such as genuinely democratic and non-corrupt legislative bodies, an impartial judiciary as well as new institutions within civil society that would function as watchdogs over the state.
It has become clear that increasing women's representation in legislatures is only possible through policies of affirmative action and quota systems. It is only through these mechanisms that women in Uganda, South Africa, Namibia and Mozambique have registered a significant presence in the legislature. There is insufficient information on what this has meant for gender justice and for democratizing the state in general. Are these women able to make autonomous decisions that might diverge from the stands taken by their party?
Strengthening the Legislature
In most countries, leading political parties have remained remarkably more resistant to women's increased participation. In the meantime, new debates that reflect on the many aspects of the disabling environment facing women and men legislators are emerging. In situations where most African parliaments do not have the power to scrutinize the governments economic agenda, and this role is taken up by insulated technocracies, there is very little that women parliamentarians can do in the realm of enhancing women's economic rights even if there was a critical mass of women parliamentarians. This implies that advocates of gender justice have to play a proactive role in civil society movements advocating for transparency and accountability.
In the recent past, women have also increased their presence in state bureaucracies and have attempted to influence policy formulation and implementation through efforts to transform the state from within. These government units often known as national machineries emerged as a result of the UN Decade of Women and take a variety of forms ranging from women's desks, focal points to women's Ministries. However, in most countries, these institutions lack a stable or continuous history. As one observer noted, these offices have been " promoted t ministerial status under one regime, brought under the chief executive's wing in the president's office in the next or shunned from one peripheral Minstery to another (no women's unit or minstery) has been able to consolidate a place in the national bureaucracy (Goetz, 1995, 14).
Not only do they lack stability, most of these units are heavily donor dependent and have faced major challenges in the context of civil service reforms, severe budget cuts. More significantly, these gender focal units are affected by the significantly weakened capacity of public administration and constantly faced with 'a deeply entrenched bureaucratic malaise' (Razavi, 2001: 114). It is for all these reason that advocates of gender justice have to actively engage in making capacity building programs and civil service reforms gender aware and gender responsive processes.
In terms of ensuring gender equitable development, at least there are at least three areas of strategic importance. One entails the provision of training opportunities and confidence building of women with a long-term view of building a gender balanced civil service and private sector. Secondly, concerted effort ought to be made to foster gender awareness and competence among both men and women in the civil service, the policy process and in planning practices. Gender analysis and planning is an acquired skill and needs to be learnt and refined. Thirdly, a much more committed effort ought to be invested to substantially increase the number of women in the tertiary level of education. In addition to increasing the representation of women in government decision-making and managerial positions, these types of new roles for women have the potential of changing societal perceptions of women's capabilities and options. In turn, these types of changes can positively influence ideologies and opportunities for women. For far too long gender and governance has been limited to a focus on increasing the number of women in decision-making positions. The challenge of engaging in a transformed state requires more imaginative visions, goals and programs.
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