Female MPs pledge to fight for a more gender-sensitive Parliament

 

Thirty-three female MPs from across the divide today made a pledge to fight for a more gender-sensitive parliament.

They vowed to make it a priority to focus on bills and policies that move towards gender equality and hold debates that reflect gender sensitivity.

The pledge was made in conjunction with International Women's Day, which is celebrated by women around the globe tomorrow.

"The United Nations Women has set ' Choose to Challenge' as the theme for this year's Women's Day. Appropriately with our responsibility as MPs, we always aim and strive to make the Malaysian Parliament a world-class institution.

"We come together to uphold the determination to make the parliament as a gender-sensitive parliament, as stipulated in the Inter-Parliamentary Union's guidelines," they said in a statement.

The guidelines state: a gender-sensitive parliament responds to the needs and interests of both men and women in its composition, structures, operations, methods and work. It removes the barriers to women’s full participation and offers a positive example or model by promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment to society both national and international.

Among the signees of the pledge are Dewan Rakyat deputy speaker Azalina Othman Said, former deputy prime minister Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail (Pandan MP), Women, Family and Community Development Minister Rina Harun (Titiwangsa MP), Teresa Kok (Seputeh) and Hannah Yeoh (Segambut).

The MPs also called other parliamentarians to take the same pledge and said members of the public also can help by pushing their respective representatives to make it their commitment.

Other vows made by the MPs in their pledge are as follows:

• To look into the possibility of reforming the electoral system to ensure a more balanced gender representation in the Parliament.
• Call for more budgets that are responsive to gender-based needs in all aspects of duties in ministries and agencies.
• Work towards creating gender equality in executing Special Select Committee programmes in the Parliament.
• Ensure that all infrastructural development in the parliament takes into account gender-based needs, and that gender equality is covered in policies regarding civil servants and MPs on duty.

"A mountain of hope starts with one step that we take today. Happy International Women's Day!" - Mkini