Madam Zuwera Mohammed Ibrahimah, the Member of Parliament for Salaga-South, has charged women to build their capacities to meet the demands of the Affirmative Action Law.

She said: “The passage of the Affirmative Action and Gender Equity Bill presents a challenge to women to work hard, build their capacities to justify their inclusion on merit and not on grounds of favour.”

The Bill offered a legal framework to cushion women’s demand for equity “but does not in itself walk any woman to the House of Parliament or leadership positions in public service,” she added.

Madam Ibrahimah, one of the 40 females in the House of Parliament and National Democratic Congress (NDC) parliamentary candidate for Election 2024, was speaking in an interview with the Ghana News Agency Gender-desk in Accra.

“While the passage of the Bill recognised the marginalisation of women and sought to address it, it also placed a high responsibility on the part of women to rise to the occasion in terms of skills and competency,” she said.

She lauded the female members of the Eighth Parliament, Civil Society Organisations, and the Speaker of Parliament for their commitment and zeal leading to the passage of the Bill.

She hoped that the President would quickly assent to the Bill so that modalities for its implementation would be made clear.

Affirmative Action (Gender Equity), which had taken years to pass, aims to address the gender disparities that have long existed in Ghanaian society.

The law is expected to enshrine measures to provide for affirmative action in the public and private sectors to ensure the progressive achievement of gender balance in all sectors by the set targets.

Currently, women’s representation in all policy-making spaces in Ghana is less than the United Nations (UN) threshold of 30 percent. In Ghana’s Legislature, women’s representation stands at 14.5 percent.