Last month, a photo of Jeanne d’Arc Nyiramahirwe made rounds on social media after she submitted her candidacy for parliamentary elections to represent women. With her baby strapped on her back, she traveled all the way from Burera district in Rwanda’s Northern Province to the Electoral Commission in Kigali. Nyiramahirwe, who is a high school teacher, will be campaigning alongside nealy 200 candidates running for just 24 seats in parliament. In the 2018 elections, this category had 179 candidates, while there were 105 and 113 in 2013 and 2008 respectively. What a trend! ALSO READ: Rwanda's eight landmark achievements in gender equality In the general suffrage, 154 women out of 346 candidates will be campaigning this year, while in 2018, they were 132 out of 306 candidates. In 2013, there were 92 women out of 269, while in 2008, there were only 79 women in 206 candidates. Rwanda had two women for every man in the recently dissolved Lower House, but can we do that again. I believe we can, and here is why: The trend since the 1990s After the 1994 Genocide Against the Tutsi, women made up more than 60 percent of the population. However, because of sexist and discriminatory laws in place and the culture dilution that further undermined the position of women in society, they were nowhere to be seen in the country’s politics. After Rwanda’s independence in 1962, there had never been any women ministers until 1992, and there weren’t any prefects or bourgmestres too. Also, the law didn’t find women legally “competent”, so they weren’t eligible for inheritance or heading a household. They needed their husband’s permission to get a job or open a bank account. In a press conference held in December 1993, the then Prime Minister Agathe Uwiringiyimana was asked by a journalist why she couldn’t get another job after her party didn’t front her to be part of the then anticipated coalition government. ALSO READ: Minister Uwamariya on Rwanda’s 30-year gender equality journey She said one of the party members didn’t want her to be jobless. She had to explain to him that she was educated and that at any time, she would get a job because she was educated. Her statement is a reminder that even then, the most powerful woman in the country had to explain in words (and not action) that she was deserving. The national hero would later be brutally murdered at the onset of the 1994 Genocide Against the Tutsi. After the Genocide, the country was suffering loss in all ways, and although women played a significant role in rebuilding this country from scratch, it was not a given. As a result of a discriminatory past, despite the fact that there were more women in the country, they only made 14 percent of the parliament. In fact, until 2002, women’s representation in parliament had never reached 25 percent. UN Women reports that in the 1990s, women made up an average of 18 percent of Rwandan Parliament members. ALSO READ: Govt to certify more institutions for gender equality After the 2003 Constitution that reserved a 30 percent quota for women in elected positions and political parties committing to voluntary quotas, a change was seen. Immediately, we see women representation grow tremendously, from 23 percent in 2002 to 48.8 percent in 2003. In the following term that started in 2008, they increased to 56.4 percent, before making a groundbreaking 64 percent in 2013, and a slight drop to 61 percent in 2018. Beyond the numbers? Sure! Some feminists argue that we need to stop asking the “beyond the numbers” question when it comes to women representation in positions of power, and I agree. I, too, have never heard a similar question in all male-dominated spaces. Nevertheless, I feel inclined to point out that most- if not all- milestones Rwanda has achieved are a result of the commitment. There couldn’t have been a worse decision than excluding the majority of the population, especially at such a crucial time for the country. Some of the landmark achievements in gender equality include land rights, abortion rights, anti-gender-based violence law, which also punishes conjugal rape, maternal health improvement, and more. We still have a journey to go as a country, but there is no doubt that we will achieve what we set out to do, and there is evidence for that. Women in Rwanda today have the power to decide for themselves and for the country, and this is commendable. The growing number of women fighting to get into parliament is a good sign that there is not a single space in this country that women cannot occupy.
