And the first woman vice-president of Ghana is...?

Yesterday I watched a programme on one of the local Ghanaian channels called 'Mbaa Nkomo' which translates from the Akan language as 'Women's conversations'. This is quite a popular show run entirely in Akan, one of the local Ghanaian languages which is quite rare in the terrain of Ghanaian broadcasting. I am normally not a big fan of the 'box' but the topic caught my attention. The topic was on women being nominated for the vice-presidency position of the Ghanaian political parties. I have found the conversations around women's political participation this year in Ghana to be quite interesting because for the first time I keep hearing people (both men and women) from all parts of society advocating for greater political participation by women and in some cases advocating for gender parity.


The format for 'Mbaa Nkomo' is usually to have selected speakers talk on the chosen subject and to have the audience respond with their thoughts. The speakers for this occassion were two queen mothers, a woman member of parliament, the Acting Director of the Ministry of Women and Childrens Affairs ( a woman) and a male reverend. The first queen mother who spoke talked about Ghana being the black star of Africa, her argument was if Ghana is the black star of Africa we should take the lead in all things including ensuring women reached the highest posts in government. She cited examples of other female leaders including Yaa Asantewaa who led the Asantes in battle against the British, Margaret Thatcher of the UK, Gelda Meir of Israel and a queen mother from Akim whose name I missed and is also unfamiliar to me ( I googled queen mother of Akim but had no luck) Can anyone reading this post who knows this queen mother comment below?


The Ag Director of MOWAC spoke about the importance of proportional representation and referred to the fact that 53% of Ghana's population consists of women. The woman MP did what I think of as a 'Sojourner Truth'. She said, and I paraphrase ' you see how confident and assertive I am, who says women are not assertive and cannot lead. There are many women in parliament who are even more confident than I am and will make good vice-presidents'. The reactions of the audience was very interesting to watch as the camera would pan from the speaker to the crowd. You could tell that many of the women were either members of women's religious groups or other women's associations. Many of the women were nodding and listening intently as the speakers spoke and would very often burst into spontaneous applause.

The reverend who was the only male on the panel of speakers said as far as he had been concerned he would prefer to have had a female president and made an argument for women being unlikely to be corrupt. The final queen mother to speak was adamant in her call for a woman vice president...the case that most of the speakers made time and time again was that since all the political parties had already chosen their presidential candidates (who are all men), then they should ensure they choose women vice-president.


What are your thoughts on women's political participation? If you are like me you are pleased that President Ellen Sirleaf-Johnson was Africa's first democratically elected woman President but nervous about the challenges she undoubtedly faces in ruling a country post conflict. If you are like me ( an African feminist) you were probably rooting for Hilary Clinton to be nominated as the Democratic party's presidential candidate but wondered whether she would be committed to women's empowerment or would pursue politics as normal. Despite these challenges I am personally in favour of gender parity in politics on the basis of fairness and a greater likelihood that based on their socialisation and experiences women are more likely to lead in a more fair, equitable and just manner. If they don't, well, I reckon they wouldn't be any worse than male leaders. What are your thoughts?


Nana Sekyiamah
Programme Officer
Fundraising & Communications