Mrs. Shirley Tony Kum, Corporate Communications Manager, Vivo Energy Ghana, has advised women to get actively involved in politics as the men.
According to her, a woman going into politics is not bad and although she is not seen doing active politics, she has a political background for where she came from and where she is now.
Speaking to Rev. Erskine on Y 107.9FM’s YLeaderboard Series she said, “There is nothing wrong for a woman to aspire to that role because globally in Africa the women representation likes out of the 12,113 parliamentarians in Africa only 24% are women and there is still more we can do”.
She furthered that Kofi Annan once mentioned that, there is no tool for development more effective than the empowerment of women but most women also feel politics is only for men.
“Our background sometimes molds us because naturally as a woman, that’s not our field but because of the low income levels, lack of confidence in politics is seen as something for the men and we think it’s not our field. But I think that women participation results in tangible gains for democracy including greater representation responsiveness in citizen needs” she emphasized.
Shirley also believes that women participation in politics will help advance gender equality and also affect both policy issues and others.
“So I think that both men and women should be sensitized to raise that deep seated perception that politics is for men only and women should also be empowered economically and educationally to be able to compete fairly with their counterparts in this space,” she added.
By: Gyamfuah Owusu-Ackom
