A Mapping Study Prepared by Dr. Reena Marwah and Ms. Jeba ...

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Towards Gender Responsive Governance in Bangladesh In India and in Pakistan, UN Women is working together with other UN agencies to ensure that the United Nations entities work in close cooperation/understanding with one another (MOUs have been signed for this purpose) for enriching the outputs and outcomes. Thus, it is within the context of the UN Women-SARO programme that the same is initiated in Bangladesh at the earliest, given the following points which merit urgency: • Achieve the outputs and goal of the 5 year regional programme (2010-2015), i.e. to scale up the learnings from India, Bhutan, and Pakistan to Bangladesh. As an exit strategy, the programme will institutionalise the above functions in a South Asia Regional Centre of Excellence for Gender Responsive Governance by 2015. • UNDP is engaged in strengthening governance at all levels of governance and there exists tremendous scope for UN Women to play a complimentary role in this context. • Willingness of the present government of Bangladesh (elected for the term 2008-13) to strengthen women’s political leadership in the context of the National Women’s Development Policy 2011. • 19 elected women parliamentarians, among whom several are responsible for portfolios through which they can make a significant change. • Reserved seats for women in the sub-district (Upazila level) and local level of governance (Union Parishad). • Election Commission (EC) set 2020 for all political parties to have women in at least one-third of all party committee posts. • MoWCA’s National Plan of Action, to be finalized by December 2011 (based on the recent Women’s Advancement Policy), for creating economic opportunities for women as well as for addressing the issue of feminization of poverty through engendering safety nets. • The civil society organizations are also active in the development sector. 10 A. Context Analysis This section provides a framework of the system of governance in Bangladesh and also delineates the supportive legislations and policies. A1. System of Governance Bangladesh is a two-tier parliamentary democracy with a unicameral central legislature. The central legislature/Parliament is elected through direct elections based on universal adult franchise for a five year term. The Prime Minister leads the government and is the head of the party/coalition that forms the majority of the Parliament. The Parliament has 345 seats including 45 reserved seats for women (being enhanced to 50), occupied by members elected from single-member constituencies for a 5 year term. The President is the constitutional head of state but this is mainly a ceremonial post elected by the Parliament. The country is divided into seven Administrative Divisions: Dhaka, Chittagong, Khulna, Rajshahi, Barisal and Sylhet, and Rangpur (added in 2010). Each Division is placed under a Divisional Commissioner and is further divided into Districts (Zila) headed by District Commissioners. The Districts are further divided into Thanas or sub-districts, and Thanas are divided into Unions or rural micro-areas, which are divided into Grams or villages. Governance at the local level in rural areas is entrusted to Gram Parishads, Union Parishads, Thana/Upazila Parishads and Zila Parishads, while in urban areas it is entrusted to Pourashavas/Municipalities (for which three classifications exist based on size of population) and City Corporations (in four of the largest municipalities) which have been given Metropolitan status – Dhaka, Khulna, Chittagong and Rajshahi. A2. Supportive Legislations and Policies The Constitution of Bangladesh in 1972 stated that women’s rights in all spheres of national life must be ensured. Article 9 states that the state shall
encourage local government institutions composed of representatives of the areas concerned, and in such institutions special representation shall be given as far as possible to peasants, workers and women. National While quotas for women in the Parliament were introduced in 1972, reserving 15 of the 315 seats in Parliament for women (to be filled through indirect elections by the directly elected 300 members), in 1978 a presidential promulgation extended reservation for women to a total of 30 seats and the number of seats in Parliament was also increased to 330. This promulgation lapsed in 1987, was reincorporated in 1990, and lapsed again in 2001. In 2004, a constitutional amendment raised the number of seats in Parliament to 345 from 300, and the quota for women was re-introduced, raising the total number of seats reserved for women to 45 from 30. Local The Local Government Ordinance of 1976 was the first ordinance to be issued with a provision for increasing women’s representation in local governance. It established a three-tier local governance system, comprising the Union Parishad at the union level, the Thana Parishad at the thana level and the Zila Parishad at the district level, and provided for the reservation of two seats for women members who would be nominated to the ten member Union Parishad. The Local Government (Union Parishads) Ordinance of 1983 raised the number of seats reserved for women in the Union Parishad from two to three, although their entry still depended on nomination. The Local Government (Union Parishads) (Amendment) Act of 1993 introduced a system of indirect election for the three seats exclusively reserved for women members in place of the earlier system of nomination. The women members on reserved seats were now to be elected by the other members of the Parishad. Towards Gender Responsive Governance in Bangladesh The Local Government (Union Parishads) (Second Amendment) Act of 1997 increased the number of seats in the Union Parishad to twelve and kept the number of seats reserved for women at three. However, it introduced direct elections for the three reserved seats, along the same lines as the elections to the general category seats. Additionally, the Act divides the union into nine wards for the election of the nine general category seats (one seat from each ward). For the three reserved seats, the union is divided into three wards, each of which is formed by grouping together three of the nine wards for general category seats. Following this, several circulars have been released by the government with the intention to assign more responsibilities to women in committees by including them in bigger numbers and giving them the chair of committees on particular issues such as primary education, old age benefits etc. Committees such as the Village Social Development Committee are also headed by women, and deal with issues such as collection of information on births and deaths, education, health awareness, family planning, violence etc. A3. Women in Politics: Assessing the Current Scenario Women’s opportunities and public participation have gone through significant changes in Bangladesh in recent decades. At the policy level, the government has brought in a strong gender equality agenda, e.g., the National Policy for Women’s Advancement, the revised National Strategy for Accelerated Poverty Reduction (NSAPR-II), gender responsive budget etc. Several women occupy positions of distinction as Ministers and parliamentarians as well as chairs of Parliamentary Standing committees and vice chairs at the upazila level. This change is visible mainly after 1997, when women could be directly elected to the Union Parishads. Women constitute 18.55% of the strength of the current Parliament of Bangladesh, i.e. 64 of the 11
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