Women Ambassadors Speak Out On Gender Equality

By Nur Ashikin Abdul Aziz, Tengku Faezah Tengku Yusof and Azzah Mohamad Som KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 3 (Bernama) -- During the International Women’s Day earlier this year, women’s organisations came up with various themes to celebrate the achievements of the fairer sex. Malaysian women too have their own reason to celebrate as over the years they not only enjoyed greater liberty but greater equality and opportunities as well. Bernama talked to three women ambassadors in the country to see how women in their respestive countries are doing and what they have to say on the achievements of women in Malaysia in closing in the gender gap. Ecuador's ambassador to Malaysia Lourdes Puma Puma opined that many countries around the world including Malaysia have reduced the gender inequality, but there is till room for improvement especially in the economic sector. There has be more laws to regulate women’s rights as well, she told Bernama here recently. Citing her home country as example, Puma Puma said the government’s effort to reduce gender gap in politics by introducing laws for equal participation was commendable. However, issues on women’s participation in the economic sector was still “a work in progress”. UNDERDEMPLOYMENT FOR WOMEN “Underemployment for women is at 60 per cent, implying that most are employed below their skill level or not given sufficient hours and men's wages are generally 20 per cent higher than women's,” she said. Puma Puma said to tackle this problem Ecuador and the United Nations signed a draft action plan on March 2015 that would promote public policies that focused on gender equality in the workplace. According to the World Economic Forum Gender Gap Report 2014, Ecuador is ranked 21 out of 142 countries, scoring 0.745 out of the 1.0 full mark for gender equality. In the list, Ecuador is the best among South American countries and has shown improvement from 2013’s list where it was ranked 25. Puma Puma, who has been in Malaysia for five years, said it was clear that the Malaysian government was committed to solving gender equality issues. The outcome from Malaysia's efforts could be seen from many competent ladies filling top positions in the country. Commenting on the 2015 Hays Asia Salary Guide that revealed 34 percent of management positions in Malaysia were held by women, an increase of five percent from last year’s list, Puma Puma said the result reflected positively on Malaysia and the women here. “We have to continue reducing this gap and I think that both Ecuador and Malaysia are committed in doing this,” she said. However, she noted that it would take time to implement any policies for gender equality and in changing the mentality of the people including the women themselves. WOMEN'S POSITION IMPROVED Turkish Ambassador to Malaysia Başak Turkoglu felt that the women's position in society has improved gradually and significantly for many years, pointing out that gender equality is enshrined as a constitutional principle in Turkey. She said that the Turkish Government has participated in efforts towards promoting gender equality in the international arena and that Turkey has been a party to the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) since 1985, as well as its Optional Protocol since 2002. "A variety of efforts have been undertaken in recent years with the objective of protecting women's rights, strengthening the position of women in social, economic, cultural and political life and of providing the equal utilisation of rights, opportunities and capacities." The sectorial employment data showed that professional women are represented by a great proportion in the fields of university teaching staff, medicine, dentistry and law, she told Bernama in an email interview. Turkoglu added that the percentage of women in management positions in Turkey has been growing steadily. Women held only four per cent of top management posts in 2004, but the figure rose up to 31 per cent in 2013, (37 per cent of judges, 35 per cent of diplomats and 28 percent of professors are currently women). “By the end of 2014, we had 32 women ambassadors in Turkey and this year, we expect to welcome six more women ambassadors," she said. She also pointed out that the right to vote and be elected was granted to Turkish women in 1934, earlier than many other western countries and 18 women were elected as members of the Parliament in that same year. Turkey was also the first country to sign and approve the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women, which is known as the “Istanbul Convention” (on May 11, 2011) in the international fora, she said. As of June last year, the convention has been signed by 37 countries including Albania, Austria, Denmark, France, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Serbia, Spain and Sweden. MALAYSIAN WOMEN HARDWORKING Meanwhile, Argentinian ambassador to Malaysia Maria Isabel Rendon admired Malaysian women whom she said were very capable and hardworking as well as holding important positions in the education and corporate sector. "If you go to a university there's so many highly qualified women in very important positions," she said when asked on the progress of Malaysian women. She said that within the corporate sector there maybe some who were not “at the very top” but yet they were still at the higher echelon with very important responsibilities. “So honestly I think Malaysian women work very hard and they deserve to be in the positions they are in now. I am sure there will a wider transformation in Malaysia," she added. However, she felt that there was still a lot to be done in the political arena in Malaysia, which she said was still mainly male dominated. She said that in Argentina a law was passed in 1991 kown as the 'electoral quota law' where political parties should ensure 30 per cent of their candidates were women. -- BERNAMA